This will sound ridiculous, but I don’t think I’ve read a pure
Sean Feast book since Thunder Bird in Bomber Command. By ‘pure’ I mean a book
where he’s listed as the sole author on the cover (not taking anything away
from his many collaborative works). Sure, I’ve dipped in and out of The Pathfinder Companion, Pathfinders – The Definitive Story and Halton Boys, but I’ve
not yet read them cover to cover. I’ve also read A Thousand and One by Humphrey
Phillips DFC ‘with Sean Feast’ (one of those rare books written by a flight
engineer). There’s lots of shouting when new books are released but I’m finding,
of late, some to be lacking either in terms of being rushed to market, scant
genuine understanding for a subject or (with my editing hat on) a lack of
interest or care at the final hurdles, with perhaps the latter two being a
function of the first. Reading Gestapo Hunter reminded me how well-crafted an
aircrew book can be.
I’ve always thought the wartime RAF to have been the finest
proponent of low-level flying (and no doubt post-war Buccaneer and Tornado
crews, for example, would agree to have continued that legacy), especially over
land. Blenheims, Bostons and Mosquitos immediately come to mind, some to
survive in an interceptor-rich environment, some to ensure a second visit wasn’t
needed. It is hard to fathom the feelings of civilians in Occupied Europe upon
seeing a loose formation of Mossies screaming by at rooftop level. It is
awe-inspiring to think of now, but it was clearly dangerous work with little
room for error, be it in finding the target easily, hitting same and reacting
to emergencies where a greater altitude would allow some options, or a chance. Giving
the game away somewhat, of all those involved in these operations, it is fair
to say Ted Sismore DSO DFC** AFC, the subject of Gestapo Hunter, was the finest
of the low-level navigators. That is saying a lot.
Interestingly, his RAF career did not initially proceed as
he wanted. While his instructors figured he’d get there eventually, such were
the exigencies of wartime that he ran out of time to solo in a Tiger Moth.
While this scuppered his dream of being a pilot for a few years, the RAF, and
the war effort at large, benefitted from this failure. Sismore would, however,
go on to fly Meteors, Javelins and Canberras, among other types, in the
post-war RAF, seeing a career through to unit command and the higher echelons
of the Service.
Having flown 26 operations on Blenheims by the end of June
1941, Ted’s subsequent posting to Malta was cut short by fever. From arriving
on the island to his repatriation, he survived a frenetic period in which the crews
of the detachment, while successful, suffered badly. The same applied to those
of his unit, No. 110 Squadron, who had remained in the UK. An uncomfortable posting
to No. 13 OTU (Ted didn’t want to be there and made it known) led to No. 24 OTU
and, interestingly, involvement as a Whitley nav in the ‘big push’ raids on
Bremen and Düsseldorf of mid-1942.
Just before these raids, the Mosquito had flown its first operational
sorties. Ted already knew he wanted to fly on a Mossie squadron; this became
a reality when Reg Reynolds, a veteran of two Bomber Command tours, teamed up
with him for posting to No. 105 Squadron. This is where the Ted Sismore legend
truly began with his ability to plan, and execute succinctly, routes to and
from targets coming to the fore. While getting ahead of myself slightly, name a
‘classic’ Mosquito raid and Ted was involved: interrupting Göring’s Berlin speech
in January 1943; deep-penetration raids; planning Operation Jericho, the raid
on the Amiens Prison; the ‘Aarhus raid’; and Operation Carthage, the March 1945
raid on Gestapo headquarters in Copenhagen. Of course, not all of these were
done with Reynolds flying the aircraft, although they did transfer to No. 139
Squadron together and were part of the early Light Night Striking Force before
briefly parting, Ted heading to No. 2 Group HQ but duly flying with the likes
of Charles Patterson and Basil Embry, the latter on some of the first ‘Noball’
strikes.
Ted and Reynolds were reunited in early 1944 when the latter
assumed the role of wing commander flying for No. 140 Wing. After some time
away learning the intricacies of Gee-H, Ted became wing navigation officer alongside
Reynolds. As always, there were ‘run of the mill’ ops interspersed by stand outs
such as the raid on the SS base at Château de Marieville in retaliation for the
murder of SAS members of Operation Bulbasket (see the recently released SAS Rogue by Peter Weaver for details of the betrayal, attack and subsequent war
crimes committed against these men). The successful Mosquito raid also saw the RAF’s
first use of napalm.
With Reynolds having flown his last operational sortie
during the Aarhus raid, Ted flew with his replacement, Bob Bateson, and Bob
Iredale, the great Australian Mossie flyer, specifically flying with the former
on Carthage and the attack on the well-camouflaged Gestapo headquarters on the
island of Funen, near Odense. Post-war flying saw him team up with another
great proponent of low-level flying, ‘Micky’ Martin, on a record-setting flight
to Cape Town before entering the world of all-weather fighters and a long Cold War
RAF career ended with ‘retirement’ into private enterprise, leveraging his
navigational and electronic-equipment expertise.
It is probably a bit of an oversell to regard the author as a
modern-day Tony Spooner or Roy Conyers Nesbit. Admittedly, he didn’t fly during
wartime, or at all as his primary career, but it’s the comprehensive understanding
of the subject that leads to this comparison. That’s the great strength of
Gestapo Hunter; Ted Sismore, while leaving behind enough of an ‘official’
record, didn’t reveal any unpublished manuscripts or diaries in his personal
collection, although he did give interviews. As a result, the author has a few
holes to fill and does so beautifully, leaning into his knowledge. His previous
works, extensive research and enduring fascination for the period come to the
fore with the ability to place Ted in the bigger picture, for example, explaining
the move of 105 and 139 Squadrons from low-level ops to the Path Finder Force
(PFF), and the reasons behind the creation of the PFF. Such ‘scene setting’
could easily lead to excessive tangents but, in every case, the author maintains
a tight rein to ensure the focus remains on Ted. This sort of control only
comes from truly understanding, being at one with the subject as it were, what
is being written about. The ability to get the point across succinctly, particularly
with complicated subjects, is a skill of great value (and why my reviews are so
long …) honed, in this case, by decades of getting to grips with all aspects of
the air war. It is impressive to read it in action. At the same time, however,
the author doesn’t assume established knowledge among his readership, making Gestapo Hunter remarkably accessible, which is another nod to his grasp of the subject.
As you’d expect from a Grub Street hardback, this is a
lovely book, the boards replicating the artwork of the dust cover, something
that remains unique among ‘modern’ aircrew books. The text is quite small, cramming
a lot of fine narrative and the standard endpapers into a little over 200 pages.
There’s the ‘classic’ glossy photo insert (eight leaves, 16 sides) with the
majority of images clear, albeit reproduced relatively small. The most interesting
of these, despite the ‘familiar’ and remarkable low-level images of Copenhagen,
etc., are of Ted and his fine colleagues, many of whom, as you’d expect, are
talked about at length in the narrative. Just before the extensive Cold War
selection of images are several from Ted’s sobering visit to Copenhagen, during
which he met with some of the families who had lost children when the school was
hit during the Carthage raid.
The Spooner/Conyers Nesbit comparison, with further
reflection, stands up well. There are very few authors consistently releasing standalone
aircrew biographies of this calibre. Gestapo Hunter is proof there are still great aircrew stories out there to be shared and that truly understanding the subject at hand, putting the
work in, is as great an instrument in ensuring their survival as spreading the
word about them.
Read wide. Talk about it!
