Thinks He's a Bird - Ian Campbell

 

I'm still flat out with manuscript editing so nothing original from me for now. However...

Ladies and gentleman, Sean Feast.

There have been a good many books on Bomber Command published recently, but not many good ones. Thinks He’s a Bird, by Ian Campbell, I am delighted to say, is one of those that is very definitely worth adding to your shelf.

It tells the story of Keith Watson, a young man from Queensland, who after the usual pattern of training overseas ultimately arrives in the UK to join Bomber Command before volunteering for Pathfinder Force (PFF), the corps d’elite. 

Describing the story in such simple terms, however, immediately does the story a gross disservice, because it is so much more than the standard bomber pilot’s biography. It is both poignant and funny, sad and uplifting in equal measure. It manages to weave in considerable detail of what life was like for a journeyman crew in training and operations with a front-line squadron with what was happening outside of Service life, relationships both inside and beyond the station and how, for example, a chance meeting while hitching a lift by the side of the A1 can lead to a lifelong friendship being forged!

For those who have little or no knowledge of Bomber Command, Thinks He’s a Bird is a great way of finding out more about what these brave men went through, and the often perilous training they had to undertake at the various AFUs, OTUs and HCUs dotted around the UK, often in some of the most inhospitable places. Factual detail is complemented by first-hand memories from Keith’s contemporary diary and subsequent interviews and is the stronger for it. 

Whereas some books are wont to gloss over the training, perhaps in fear of boring the reader or wishing (with understandable logic) to spend more time on their (‘more exciting’) operational flights, the author almost appears to take the contrary view and should be congratulated for it. Even as, dare I say it, an experienced author and – first and foremost – an avid reader of anything Bomber Command, I didn’t find myself speed reading to ‘get to the good bits’. The author’s easy style, helped by some intelligent editing, made this a very comfortable and enjoyable read from start to finish.

What I particularly enjoyed was how – intentionally or otherwise – the book helps to explode some of the myths of Bomber Command generally and Pathfinder Force specifically. The way, for example, that the pilot rejected one of the crew as not being up to the mark, which flies against the generally held belief that every crew was an unbreakable unit like a merry band of modern-day musketeers. They were not: tensions among crew members could easily spill over into something worse; personalities often clashed; competency and skill were not a given. Some were not up to the job.

Pathfinder Force, similarly, was not the well-oiled machine it is sometimes made out to be. Chaos and disorganisation were constant spectres at the feast, as evidenced by Keith’s own experiences in joining PFF. 

Having initially been identified as ‘gen’ crew in training (usually because of the skill of the pilot, navigator and air bomber (PNB) team), he did not go straight to PFF as was usual. (At one stage of the war, one third of new PFF crews were drawn direct from training, with the remainder taken from crews that were currently operating or those returning from a ‘rest’). Instead, he is posted to a Main Force squadron prior to being posted to the Pathfinder Navigation Training Unit at Warboys. But even when he does finally commence his PFF training, he is sent back to Main Force, owing to an administrative foul-up. It transpired that 5 Group had sent down too many crews for training – undoubtedly the result of a miscommunication between 5 Group and 8 Group (PFF), which was similarly no doubt a by-product of the enmity that existed between the respective AOCs – Cochrane (5 Group) and Bennett (8 Group).

So is there anything wrong with the book? Nope. Not as far as I can see. It is long, which when your glass is half full means you’re getting excellent value for money. It’s a shame it’s not a hardback, or that the quality of imagery isn’t better, but that’s only a minor issue, and in fairness – as a paperback – I would argue the production is as good as you will find. There are a few very minor points I could take issue with, but to do so would be churlish. This is a thoroughly enjoyable, well researched and well-written book which deserves every success.

ISBN 978-1-92261-5-152

Boys, Bombs and Brussels Sprouts - J. Douglas Harvey

 

More than three months into 2022 and all I've done is add several covers of new books as they've crossed my desk. As before, the manuscript editing work is keeping me busy (follow Wright Stuff Editing & Proofreading if you want to get an idea of what I'm up to) and away from review writing, even reading. For the lack of content on here, I apologise. I must also proffer humblest apologies to Robert Brokenmouth, guest reviewer, for holding on to this and two other reviews since July. It doesn't feel like that long, but the emails say otherwise. Here, then, from a writer who knows how to get inside the head of a Bomber Command author, is a review of a book that some have said is quite hilarious (in a good way). That's not something you come across too often with BC, but there you have it. It's also a book I simply have not been able to find a nice copy of for a decent price. When I do, the postage is silly. Anyway, that's too many of my woes. Enjoy. Andy Wright.

We all have our favourite aviation books. You might think mine can be guessed at: Cheshire, Gibson, Charlwood, Cusack, Ollis.

 

Well, those five, yes. But there are several others; Yates (see here) is one, and this little cracker is another.

 

While some of us buy a military autobiography because we have an interest in the historical events, the small boy inside us (certainly me, I’m afraid) wants nothing but incredible adventures. Mel Rolfe’s series of books were hugely popular for that reason. Sprouts is brimming with events and details I have never read before in an aviation biography (never mind one on Bomber Command). Harvey’s knack of recall of specific things brings into sharp focus the grimmer everyday aspects of RAF life – told in such a way that sharp cackles of laughter on the bus are so frequent that you’ll get looks from disapproving teenagers. I won’t spoil it – though I’d love to – but Harvey tells his story with frankness, comic contempt, and an astonishing tenderness. It’s a hugely powerful book and, if you've not read it, you are in for a treat.

 

Harvey, a Canadian, joined No. 408 Squadron, Bomber Command, in June 1943 and survived to be screened in April 1944. Like Cusack and Ollis, he has little respect for the RAF system of promotion (arguing with the CO about the fact that officers get more pay than sergeants and all essentially do the same job; again, I won't spoil it). Unlike those two, however, he can recount a fantastic and very rare appearance by Bomber Harris.  

 

Lastly, if there’s a sorely overlooked book of the bombing war just waiting to be written, it's about the fussy, impractical, bullet-proof officer who wangles a posting to ops and proceeds to stuff everything up with a sort of self-justified glee. Cusack and Ollis each encountered one of these ding-bats (to the point where one surmises that a principal reason for writing about their experiences in the first place is to reveal and humiliate the ding-bat). Yates was one of these training characters, but he at least comprehended that he was far from invincible and endeavoured to bring back his crew (and himself) alive. Harvey encounters not one but two (leading me to think there should definitely be more known about these characters); and, not wishing to spoil the surprise, I’ll leave it there.

 

Let your fingers do the walking, as they say, and fish out the credit card. This is a somewhat under-appreciated (I won’t say ‘forgotten’) work that should be a perennial like the works of the ‘famous five/six’ mentioned above.

ISBN 978-0-77104-0-481

Luck and a Lancaster - Harry Yates DFC

Well, I'm still struggling to find the time to get reviews written, despite the increasing stack of finished books accumulating on one end of the desk. I am planning a return to 'Monday review writing' but that assumes I can continue to manage the manuscript edit deadlines. It is good to be busy! Anyway, I've pulled a guest reviewer out of my quiver and he's pointed himself at a very worthwhile target. Robert Brokenmouth, intrepid local music scene reporter, auction house denizen, and raconteur, has appeared on ABR before as a reviewer but, more importantly, as the editor of new, annotated editions of the Australian bomber aircrew classics 'They Hosed Them Out' and '101 Nights'. His work on these titles produced two of the greatest additions to wartime aircrew literature of the 21st century. Therefore, it is a pleasure to publish his review of a title from the end of last century, from the end of a decade that was arguably the high watermark in terms of wartime memoirs seeing the light of day. Andy Wright.

Originally published in 1999 by Airlife (and then Wrens Park and Crowood Park), Luck and a Lancaster tells the oft-repeated tale of a young man who wanted to fly and ended up in Bomber Command ... but the writing, the vivid nature of the author’s recall, and his overall story, commands attention.

Yates takes us through his initial training in 1940, through his eighteen-month unwanted stint as a flying instructor, and then op by op to the end of his tour with No. 75 Squadron on 30 December 1944. It is ironic in so many ways that Yates, with his heart set on Beaufighters or Mosquitos, insisted on getting himself transferred to ops and ended up on Lancs in Bomber Command. Luck?

Running through it all is his reflection on luck, as if it is some sort of tangible imp peering down at us and occasionally cackling. Chance plays a huge part in warfare; most soldiers take part in only a few battles in their career; but almost any bombing operation was effectively a battle in itself. As aviation buffs know, a tour of operations was ... thirty battles. 

If you survived.

Yates has a story to tell and he gets on with it, occasionally contrasting related events with observations of history which are well known today, but were unknown to the airmen at the time. His easy to digest style means you power through the book, occasionally pausing to gasp in disbelief or horror (Yates’s crew had an eventful tour, to say the least). Despite the passage of the years, we are gripped by a matter-of-fact narrative of a crew in the midst of powerful events and a determination for Yates and his men to survive.

One thing which strikes me on this reading (my fourth or fifth) is the large number of people we should know more about, but simply don’t. They either haven’t written a book or haven’t left sufficient detail of themselves to survive into the digital age. Squadron Leader Jack Leslie is a perfect example.

Luck and a Lancaster does not have the bitterness of Gibson, the naivete of Cheshire, or the reflectiveness of Charlwood, but its measured, tense pace, and contrast between the young man who the old man remembers, means this book belongs on your shelf. 

Nutshell? Forgotten classic.

ISBN 978-1-84037-0-799

The Boy with Only One Shoe - John Henry Meller with Caroline Brownbill

We’ve been fortunate to see some heavily promoted Bomber Command memoirs/biographies see the light of day this year (as mentioned below). One that has been seemingly ‘everywhere’ is The Boy with Only One Shoe. The authors are working on a post-war sequel, which will make a nice companion, that will hopefully provide some insight into how a Bomber Command veteran adjusted to life outside the RAF. He served as a policeman after the war, so perhaps it was a more gentle transition, moving from one institution to another as it were. Anyway, BC historian, oral history interviewer, and long-time ABR guest reviewer, Adam Purcell kindly sent in his review of The Boy with Only One Shoe. You may remember him from his reviews for Norman Franks’s Veteran Lancs and Night Duel over Germany by Peter Jacobs. He also runs the Something Very Big blog about his ongoing research into a relative’s Bomber Command career. Andy Wright

It’s a familiar sort of story. World War II begins. At first, the boy is too young, but he enlists in aircrew the instant he turns eighteen. Basic training follows and he’s awarded an aircrew brevet. Then comes operational training, crewing up, converting onto big four-engine bombers. The new crew joins a squadron, flies on operations and has one or two close calls. Then the war ends. Call it a fairly standard career for a surviving member of Bomber Command. With greater or lesser degrees of variation, stories like this have been told in countless books over the years. Yes, the story of John Henry Meller, in the new book The Boy with Only One Shoe, follows much the same arc, but what’s notable about this book is that it’s been published in 2020, seven and a half decades since the end of the war. It’s the rarest of rare things: a recently written first-hand account by a Bomber Command airman. There just aren’t many veterans left alive these days, let alone ones who still have the drive and skill to vividly write a story about events of so long ago and then publish it.     

To be clear, Meller’s daughter, Caroline Brownbill, a former airline pilot, is credited as a co-author. It’s not clear how much of the work is hers, but that doesn’t matter. The narrative is cohesive and in a consistent voice. Brownbill is also, it seems, doing a lot of the publicity work around the release of the book, which was self-published via Amazon in May 2020. The authors are planning to donate proceeds from sales of the book to the RAF Benevolent Fund, and Meller signs and writes a personal message on virtually every copy they sell, which is a nice touch.

John Henry Meller served as a wireless operator with 149 Squadron, flying operations on Lancasters from February 1945. That experience, and all the bits and pieces that go with it, necessarily forms the core of The Boy with Only One Shoe. This book, however, has so much more to offer too. The early sections about growing up in the English town of Warrington in the 1920s and 30s are detailed, and the descriptions of life as a teenage civilian in the early years of the war are full of life. Post-war, Meller remained in the Royal Air Force for a few years and there are some very interesting sections about postings to exotic places like Egypt and Libya. 

His personal recollections are great, and include some unusual details. I knew that RAF recruits, undergoing basic training in London, ate their meals in a restaurant at London Zoo, for example, but I didn’t know that while there they were also told they would be responsible for ‘protecting or detaining’ any of the zoo animals that might escape as a result of air raid damage. There’s also one of the better descriptions of the training and operational role of the wireless operator I’ve seen in an aircrew memoir. 

These are the sorts of details you can’t easily get from official files and archives; you really need the recollections of someone who was there. There’s a fascinating discussion of a lecture attended during Meller’s wireless operator course, during which it was clearly communicated to the trainees exactly what risk they were taking by becoming aircrew. The fatality rate in Bomber Command at the time, they were explicitly told, was 46%. Common knowledge now, of course, and certainly by the time a crew had been on a squadron for a few months they would have been well aware of the ‘chop rate’, but this is the first time that I’ve heard of aircrew being directly told about it while still in training. It makes their decisions to continue that training all the more courageous.  

The Boy with Only One Shoe (the significance of the title is explained in a short introductory section in the book) came about after Meller’s son-in-law persuaded him to write about his wartime experiences, primarily for his grand-daughter. The book is therefore pitched at an audience that may not have much understanding of Bomber Command and the context into which it fitted. Meller provides a lot of that context with explanations of what was going on in the wider conflict at the time and, while some of these bits aren’t done as well as the parts of the story based on his own experiences, he nevertheless manages to successfully weave his own story into the wider one.

My only criticisms about the book are, I think, a direct result of its self-published roots. The story is great and the writing is engaging, but in some ways the execution doesn’t do the story all the justice it deserves. Editing can be hit and miss, with the occasional superfluous punctuation and, on one occasion, ‘where’ used in place of ‘were’. There are one or two minor errors in terminology that probably should have been picked up, too: cumulonimbus clouds are called ‘Cumulus Nimbus’ on page 175, for example. Formatting inside is a little inconsistent, particularly when dealing with block quotes. There is a contents page, but it’s not very useful: it only lists ‘Chapter 1’, ‘Chapter 2’ and so on, despite all the chapters being individually titled. The cover, though attention-grabbing with an illustration of a Lancaster with an engine on fire, is printed on cheap stock and not very hardy. My copy marked too easily, copping several dings from one or two trips in my bag. 

Don’t get me wrong, I really liked this book, and Amazon’s global reach makes it very accessible to the widest possible audience, but it’s a great shame this story was not picked up by a traditional publisher, who might have had the expertise to overcome the few niggles I had with it. Putting that to one side, though, The Boy with Only One Shoe is a good read. It’s honest, engaging and true to life, and it’s a never-before-heard Bomber Command story, written by someone who was there.

ISBN 978-1-83804-6-705

Bomber Command arrivals - how to tell a story

 

Two days, two Bomber Command book arrivals, both written by somewhat removed relatives. Same, same, but different. Two approaches to presenting a similar tale. Both allow the reader to ‘know’ the ‘hero’.

 

Jane Gulliford Lowes’s Above Us, The Stars is one of two new English Bomber Command biographies receiving a good dose of attention at the moment (the other being The Boy With Only One Shoe by John Meller and Caroline Brownbill). Above Us, The Stars is Jane’s investigation of her great-uncle’s experiences with 10 Squadron RAF. Jack Clyde was a Halifax wireless operator and completed his tour in early March 1944.

 

The author uses a creative narrative to tell the story, along with a tonne of references (and ten veterans personally interviewed, one of the first things I checked was the bibliography), and goes to great lengths to accurately portray the world these men inhabited. Little is left wanting in terms of understanding the stresses they went through with what appears to be a good study of the threat of being deemed LMF (Lack of Moral Fibre) supported by numerous comments from primary and secondary sources. The members of the crew, and specifically Jack Clyde of course, are also placed in social settings as readily as the familiar operational environment. This allows a greater understanding of their lives and gets them under the reader’s skin.

 

The second book to arrive was Over the Alps by Moonlight. This is a series of letters and aerographs written by Australian Lancaster pilot (12 Squadron RAF) Robert Yell and compiled by Susan Yell (his niece). An older publication, released in 2009, its approach couldn’t be any more different from Above Us The Stars. Instead of building a narrative, Susan wrote an excellent, well-referenced introductory ‘essay’ that sets the scene while also laying out Bob’s journey in detail not included in the letters. Other than single line entries from the logbook, interspersed between the letters as time progresses, Susan lets Bob do the rest. The correspondence is mostly from Bob to his parents, but also includes replies and letters to/from several other relatives. 

 

There is very little in the way of operational detail in Bob’s writing, for obvious reasons, so there isn’t a lot of hard evidence as to how he was getting on. Certainly, he was working and playing hard. He was clearly keen to reassure his family he was okay. There is one indication as to the mounting pressure he was under, however. He wrote 51 letters, averaging one a week, up until he started flying on ops. For the six months of his tour, from 24 July 1943 until he was lost on his 30th trip on 14 January 1944, he wrote just seven letters and preferred the shorter format of the aerograph (seventeen in all, a brand new method for mail to Australia in 1943). No doubt busy on ops and then busy wanting to relax and forget it all on leave.

 

Bob’s letters regularly include mention of what was making news of the time, nicely placing him in context. Other than a few photos, the collection of letters (handed down through the family over time), the headstone at Hanover War Cemetery, and perhaps the DFC he was awarded (for a ‘shaky do’ over Berlin on 26 November 1943), there is little to remember Bob by so this book is greatly valued.

 

As a lovely piece of serendipity, I noted, while flicking through both books, Jack and Bob were both operational at the same time, albeit Jack had a few ops to his credit before Bob got underway. A quick look revealed they both flew on the 24 July Hamburg raid, the first op for Bob and his crew. There may have been other nights when they attacked the same target, but I haven’t gone that deep yet. It was just nice to consider here were two books, written years and half a world apart, deposited on my doorstep within a day of each other, and featuring men who shared the same patch of night sky over occupied Europe on at least one occasion. That the books exhibit two different styles of story telling shows the variety that can be employed if the effort is made to really understand how the subjects lived, the skills they developed and used, what they experienced and how it affected them. That, surely, is the greatest way to honour their memory.

 

ISBN 978-1-83859-555-5

ISBN 978-0-73262-227-5

Fatal Mission - Mal Elliott

Amid the flurry of Australian aircrew books released mid-year by at least three publishers, a re-invigorated Big Sky Publishing contributed two (three if you count Bob Grandin’s Vietnam-era Answering the Call). Pleasingly, one of these books looks at a Lancaster crew with 467 Squadron. Despite the continued, sadly belated, public recognition of Bomber Command and its people in recent years (coinciding with the memorial construction and unveiling in London in 2012), I am struggling to think of another recent book concentrating on 467 Squadron. Therefore, Mal Elliott’s Fatal Mission is most welcome, particularly as it tells the story of another crew in detail, a crew that would most likely have remained remembered by family members and little else. While falling short in some of the important periphery knowledge, most of which should have been picked up in the editorial process, Fatal Mission makes sense of the confusion and emptiness too often left when a crew went down.

The author is the nephew of one of the men in the crew. Oscar Furniss, the navigator, had a fairly average childhood, albeit in the idyllic surrounds of the Blue Mountains in New South Wales, and graduated with a Diploma of Agriculture in 1941. Aviation had always distracted him, however, so, with the war well and truly underway, he signed up in December before officially enlisting in July 1942. Selected to become a navigator, partly because of his strength in mathematics, Oscar went to Canada, receiving his brevet in April 1943, before finally reaching the UK in June. Caught up in the system, the subsequent months were interspersed with periods of idleness and, of course, eventual postings to an Advanced Flying Unit and then an OTU. Oscar was slowed down somewhat, by proving susceptible to the cold and wet English weather, and was hospitalised several times with bronchitis. Despite this, he managed to stay with his crew as they progressed to a Heavy Conversion Unit and then Lancaster Finishing School. It was not until April 1944, more than three years after signing up, that Oscar (and his crew) was posted to Waddington and 467 Squadron (he was eventually told he would be discharged once a replacement nav was found).

A frustrating start of two cancelled ops quickly gave way to the crew successfully completing their first on 18 April when they were part of the raid attacking the Juvisy railway yards near Paris. By 4 May, five of the seven-man crew were dead.

They were shot down by a night fighter during the successful, but tragically confused, Mailly-le-Camp raid to the east of Paris. Interestingly, unlike the majority of Lancasters, which were shot down while orbiting and awaiting the order to bomb, the crew of ‘Naughty Nan’, the rather troublesome veteran Lanc they had flown their first op on, was lost as they cleared the target. Two men survived, Stan Jolly and Bob Hunter, one badly burned (Hunter), and managed to avoid German imprisonment, albeit with Hunter confined to hospital, until liberated by advancing Allied forces. It is their memories, along with eyewitness accounts on the ground, which add substantial, and important, detail regarding the bomber’s final moments.

The book is a fairly standard approach to this kind of story. There is a personal connection followed in detail, crew members are progressively introduced, their roles and training explained, contemporaries add depth, and then there’s ops and the loss. A lot of work has clearly gone in to every stage with the analysis of the crash, and piecing together its timeline, done really well. I was somewhat concerned to read, in the acknowledgements, the author thanking an esteemed military author for massaging his notes into a ‘richly detailed manuscript’. Having already flicked through the book beforehand, and having met the author several weeks previously, I had wondered where his voice was as it did not seem to come through strongly at all. The narrative is, however, very nicely done and despite the issues I had with some core Bomber Command knowledge, Fatal Mission was near impossible to put down.

Near impossible to put down, but so very frustrating on occasion as a myriad of avoidable errors dilute the effectiveness of the delivery. Granted, it’s quite likely the ‘man on the street’ might not pick up on such things, but this is history so the effort needs to be made. 

While nicely illustrated, with images placed throughout the book, the reproduction and inclusion of some photos left much to be desired. Two menus are included in a timely manner, but are so small they are virtually unreadable and, therefore, of little use. A photo of a replica (fibreglass) Spitfire on a pole, a restored, unarmed ‘warbird’ Mosquito and a post-war modified Anson are used to depict these types. Fair enough, they get the point across, but the availability of wartime images of all three means a missed opportunity, and a relatively easy one that could have been fulfilled. The Anson in particular looks to be one of the post-war developments of the Mk.XIX. When there were literally thousands of Ansons serving in Canada, it is frustrating an image of one of these, of which there would be many, could not be used instead to better depict what Oscar trained on.

Unit codes for 467 Squadron are photo-shopped onto a descriptive image of a Lanc in Chapter Five (a chapter that purports to be about the Lancaster as an aircraft, but loses its way somewhat despite some good images of crew positions). Sadly, these codes are not easy to distinguish and the effort performed on this image makes one wonder why the same wasn’t done to the aircraft on the cover, the codes and configuration of which bear little resemblance to ‘Naughty Nan’ (also mentioned on the cover).  

That’s all a bit anorak-y of me, more so than usual, but here’s another one. Off the cuff comments like ‘…the Lancaster and the P51 Mustang were generally fitted with Packard engines’ are misleading. Less than half of the Lancasters built had Packard Merlins. Nothing general about it. Look, things like the cover will attract attention and make the book sell. Good. It’s quite possible most people who read it won’t even notice what’s mentioned above, but the perpetuation of such things does nobody any good. Like referring to using Harvards as trainers in Australia or Cheshire being Master Bomber for Mailly-le-Camp…

The appendices are particularly good and evidence of the amount of digging the author did to uncover the story of his relative and the crew. The accounts of the two survivors are included in full, with additional comments, and must have been difficult to contemplate given the details they provide about Oscar’s final moments. The book ends, however, with the bibliography. There is no index. It needs one, as does any book of this genre. Four index pages, two leafs, would have been enough to elevate this work further.

An attractive paperback of just over 200 pages, Fatal Mission exudes quality, but falls a little short with the fine detail, the supporting detail that would have added further depth to the extensive research performed by the clearly inexhaustible author. Could some of it have been lost in translation by the ‘ghost writer’? Possibly, but the flip side of this is the nicely crafted narrative. An enjoyable reading experience will probably trump the various niggles in the historical fact and this is to the benefit of the men of ‘Naughty Nan’. They are more likely to be fondly remembered, by a reader with no prior connection to them, if the book is savoured. That is, after all, the whole point – to keep their memory, and their story, alive. Mind you, understanding their world, and portraying it accurately, helps too.

ISBN 978-1-922265-14-2

Fighting High Publishing - 50% discount offer

As part of Aircrew Book Review's tenth anniversary celebrations, Steve Darlow, the man behind Fighting High, publisher of some of the finest hardback aircrew books on the market, and staunch supporter of the Bomber Command Memorial and the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund is offering the books pictured below for 50% off their normal price (signed editions included)!!!

All you have to do is visit the Fighting High website, select the books you want to buy, and enter the code 'ABR' in the discount field at checkout. This generous offer will run until the end of April. Enjoy!

75 (NZ) Squadron - Chris Ward and Chris Newey

It’s been a while since I’ve featured a guest reviewer and now seems as good a time as any what with the amount of work I have on at the moment that is taking me away from review writing for ABR. Robert Brokenmouth is the editor of Wakefield Press’ two most successful aircrew books published this century: They Hosed Them Out and 101 Nights. Both are books written as fiction by their former aircrew authors, but, as Robert was able to discover and then prove with extensive references, both titles are actually slightly fictionalised memoirs. They are also incredible reads and enduring, yet underrated, Australian aircrew classics. Robert is also a music reviewer of note with a particular style and entertaining turn of phrase. It is, therefore, a treat to feature one of his aircrew book reviews here for the first time. Andy Wright

Essential purchase. Cheap, given the fact this monster runs to 475 pages, all on foolscap-size paper. Holy moly! Okay, let's get our breath back. Why is the book so thick? Partly because 75 Squadron flew "more sorties than any other Allied heavy bomber squadron, suffering the second-highest number of casualties”. Also, there's a wealth of photos but, crucially, the publisher hasn't opted for brevity over quality - this series aims to provide the best overview of each squadron possible. It's not just 'a topic' to the writers, it's a vivid reality.

For many years 75 Squadron was famous; consequently it's been covered in other books (Saunders' Return at Dawn, and Franks' Forever Strong, for example). So why on earth would you buy Mention the War's profile? And especially one this fat?

Well, firstly, Saunders' book is very hard to come by. And, second, Franks' book covers the squadron history from 1916 to 1990 and, at 252 pages, that's essentially an overview, not an in-depth look at the unit’s operations in World War Two like this. Ah, see, now we're talking.

Have you ever met a real stamp collector? I mean, the kind who research the period and countries they're interested in, who also collects postmarks as much as stamps? These are the kind of people interested in the reality of history, who don't just read a book, they have period maps, background reading and biographies. And stonking reference books like this. 

Ward and Newey's achievement here is quite, quite remarkable, telling a huge story with as much detail as possible (in the circumstances - nothing short of reprints of the Operations Record Book (or Form 540, or ORB) will satisfy some of us), giving us names, details, events. It's a herculean task. 

I asked Newey about it (Facebook is occasionally useful). "Chris Ward wrote the initial manuscript, I curated the photos and provided some New Zealand and background content, based on the research I'd done, and the comprehensive squadron databases compiled by Simon Sommerville, who you should mention, as he's put an enormous amount of work into his website www.75nzsquadron.com.”

The squadron became famous for several reasons during the war (I'll let you find out about a few of those yourself), but a couple of members of the squadron you'll have heard of. One of the most incredible acts of bravery to earn the (inevitably embarrassed) hero a VC was performed by ‘Jimmy’ Ward, co-pilot of a Wellington after a raid on Munster on 7 July 1941. After an attack by a night-fighter, one of the fuel tanks on the starboard wing caught fire. Ward volunteered to climb out onto the wing to put the fire out. If you're not familiar with the story, I won't spoil it.

Newey and Ward (apparently no relation) simply quote from the ORB and, believe me, that makes for extraordinary reading (there are other accounts; Hector Bolitho, in Penguin in the Eyrie, describes meeting Jimmy at the Savoy Hotel bar and bandaging his finger, Jimmy died in action a few days later).

Navigator Eric Williams found himself on the wrong end of a parachute after his Stirling was attacked on 17 December 1942. If the name seems familiar, it's because he escaped from Stalag Luft III, with Michael Codner and Oliver Philpot, and reached neutral Sweden a little over a year after his initial capture. See The Wooden Horse, film or book or both.

Other notables rubbed shoulders with the unwashed in 75 Squadron. Frank Gill continued in the RNZAF after the war, rising to be air commodore before entering politics, ending his career as NZ Ambassador to the USA, and Sir Douglas Lowe stayed in the RAF to become quite a senior officer indeed. "Not famous in their own right," continues Newey, "but two individuals who were lost in action were brothers of famous people - pilot Raymond Going, brother of legendary All Black halfback Sid Going, and navigator James Lovelock, brother of Olympic 1500m gold medallist and world record-holder Jack Lovelock. Another unique character was Sergeant Sir Charles Thomas Hewitt Mappin, RAFVR, a baronet and member of the House of Lords, who volunteered as a gunner in the RAF, and is said to have refused a commission and a ground job. Killed in action."

During World War Two, 75 Squadron took part in 739 operations, putting up aircraft for 8017 sorties. They're just numbers until you remember, 'Oh, yeah, there was usually only about a three percent chance of you making it through a tour of 30 operations'. 

Unlike stamp collectors and their knowledgeable breadth of history, when you pick up RAF Bomber Command Profiles: 75 (NZ) Squadron, sure, you'll be thrilled, you'll be dumbstruck, you'll have a decent whisky to hand and possibly some cheesy snacks, but you'd have to have a heart of stone not to need a box of tissues handy.

ISBN 978-1-9112553-4-5

Lancaster Bale Out - Clive Smith

I get a bit twitchy when I see a new Bomber Command book written by a relative of an airman. That’s a bit jaded so don't mind me. My ultimate desire when reading is to bury myself in a memoir. A book written by a relative could never be regarded as a memoir. Or could it? Lancaster Bale Out is a quality Bomber Command book written by the second cousin of a 106 Squadron RAF WOp/AG. It is not really, however, a gunner's story. It is largely the wartime tale of his bomb aimer, the sole survivor of the crew. More than anything, it is his memoir.

The author’s second cousin, Jack Hougham, trained in the UK and was ready for OTU by late 1942. Fred Smooker, the bomb aimer, was from County Durham and a coal miner like his father. Interestingly, a number of the eventual Lanc crew had been miners or were from a mining family. Perhaps a sixth sense for that sort of thing contributed to bringing them together. Anyway, Fred began training as an observer proper in Canada. Clever and astute, he unfortunately suffered from terrible homesickness and gave up during his course to the point that he failed. He was re-mustered on the first bomb aimer course in Canada, returned to the UK and had joined a crew of five at OTU by the end of October 1942. His pilot was an American, a relatively rare thing in Bomber Command, and a chap who proved to have his head screwed on straight when it came to flying ops.

Before long they picked up another gunner and a flight engineer and converted to the Lancaster before joining 106 Squadron at Syerston. Their first operational trip as a crew was to Lorient in France on the night of 2/3 March 1943, but the intercom failed and they wisely returned home. Their first completed op was to Essen three nights later. They flew their fifth completed op at the end of April. Rosner, the American pilot, was one of those skippers who liked to keep weaving and rarely flew straight and level when not on the bomb run. He would also ‘go downhill’ on the way home so the Lanc picked up a bit of extra speed. His actions were indicative of an impressive, competent crew who got through a few scrapes during their tour.

Sadly, all the skill and attentiveness can never make up for a bomber crew’s luck running out, be it on their first op or their thirtieth. On the way home on three engines after their 20th op, a raid on Cologne on 8/9 July, they were shot down by a German fighter. The rear gunner managed to bail out, but was killed. Fred Smooker, the bomb aimer, was the only man to survive. He managed, through the help of a dizzying array of brave French men and women, to spend the best part of three months evading capture and was on the way to Spain by train when the authorities caught up with him. Amazingly, he then spent 56 days in solitary confinement in a Parisian prison before arriving at Stalag IVB in early December 1943. There he remained for the duration. He returned home with a desire to pick up where he left off and finished his mining studies to become a mining engineer. He took his young family to India for six years in 1951 to work on the railways and eventually retired in the early seventies for health reasons. While working in coal pits could never be referred to as good for anyone’s health, Fred’s experiences in France and Germany – the injuries, rough treatment and general malnutrition – must have also played a part. He died in 2008, some thirteen years after replying to the author’s initial contact.

This book has two main strengths. Firstly, the majority of the narrative was put together by Fred Smooker. He had written about parts of his wartime career over the years. Indeed, the author discovered he was still alive when he read one of these accounts. Once Fred and Clive got together, however, Fred committed to writing a full account of his war from start to finish. This is what LBO is all about and why it is really a memoir. The style is quite conversational and Fred is surprisingly honest about his fears and trepidation throughout his adventures, be they training in Canada or on the run in France. He is not afraid to expose his failings despite his upbringing in a stable household and ability to work in harsh conditions. His time underground built a natural strength, physically and mentally, that was tested time and again after he was shot down. It takes a special person to continually go deep into the earth to follow a relatively narrow coal seam and this determination played a large part in getting him through.

The second main strength of LBO is the author’s beautifully light touch. He recognises the value of what Fred provided him with in instalments over the years. Footnotes are many and detailed and the appendices include copies of official documents and list the crews, and the details of their losses, that some of the men Fred encountered were a part of. There are several sections in the narrative where it is clear the author has added some context or additional detail, but I am certain there are a few more I didn’t pick up on such is the seamless way they have been stitched into Fred’s words. There is very little discussion of bomber tactics, or the development and evolution of same, so the narrative remains focused on the crew and, of course, Fred. His writing is supported by a large number of letters written by his Canadian mid-upper gunner and the author inserts passages written by contemporaries, most notably the author of Lancaster to Berlin, Canadian Walter Thompson DFC*. That said, the training and operational side of things last for just over 100 pages, in a 300-plus page book, with Fred’s evasion and incarceration taking up the majority of what's left. His account of his time as a POW paints quite a bleak picture, but he slowly rebuilds his confidence and general health to the point where he begins to work on escaping. There is little mention of escape committees and the like. If anything, the theme is one of survival rather than continuing on with tales of derring-do. It doesn’t stand out in the myriad POW accounts, but it is well written and pulls few punches despite Fred having had the benefit of several decades to reflect.

You know how you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover? Well, to some extent, and perhaps necessarily, I still do, so you can imagine what I first thought of LBO. Horrendous. The book has sold well, however, so a possible second edition should see a much more attractive and accurate design. This one was a product of the publisher and, considering how well Tucann did with the rest of the book, it’s a bit of a let down if you look for accuracy in a cover as an indication of an aircrew book’s content.

Lancaster Bale Out is a true page-turner. It suffers from very few niggles – some weird comma use and the mention of the US not being at war in 1942 were about it – that are almost completely hidden by a narrative that will hold any reader in rapt fascination. This book will not last long as a purely self-published (more or less) effort. A specialist publisher is bound to pick it up and run with it and it is exciting to think of Fred’s story, and the author’s fine work with the narrative, being presented in a second edition. Either way, this is one recent Bomber Command book that should be on your shelf. It is a solid, well-illustrated paperback that you will struggle to put down. While the author, when he set out to satisfy his enduring fascination with his second cousin’s wartime service, did not intend to tell Fred Smooker’s story, it is the outcome of one of those coincidences so often encountered when researching Bomber Command. A truly impressive package.

ISBN 978-1-907516-26-9