A Special Duty (7 page)

Tented Camp at Brindisi taken by Roger Alves

(Photo courtesy of Steve Alves)

“Considering the type of work and the long flying hours, rations are very unsatisfactory as regards quality and quantity. A small packet of biscuits, often stale, small slab of chocolate and a packet of chewing gum, in my opinion, do not constitute sufficient rations for a flight of anything up to eight hours.”

Security was a further consideration as there were still a few unfriendly elements in Brindisi town, and pilfering from the airbase was a constant problem. The men were issued with revolvers for their personal safety and warned to be vigilant, but, despite the difficulties, morale was good. They were delighted to be out of the Libyan Desert, and looked forward to the challenge of new routes and destinations. The Air Ministry had recently ruled that the Squadron was to be known in future as 148 (Special Duties) Squadron, though under no circumstances were the men to mention this in any private correspondence.

When flying recommenced on the 1
^st
February 1944, the Squadron came under 334 Wing, and a change of policy meant that Poland became the top priority, followed by the Italian partisans in northern Italy, and lastly the Balkans,
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many of whose supply drops were now being undertaken by the American 62 Group and their shorter-range C47 transport aircraft. Operating from Brindisi would mean a much more efficient supply-run to the Balkans, reducing a seven-hour round trip to Albania to three hours, and extending the range of the Halifax further into the Italian Alps and to Poland. One of the early drawbacks proved to be the single runway, which was very susceptible to strong crosswinds, and a number of aircraft were damaged in the tricky conditions. Despite this, on the first night of operations from the new base, ten of the eleven serviceable aircraft set off for Balkan targets, and all but two were successful. The Storey crew destination that first night out of Brindisi was Croatia, and a supply-drop to the GEISHA Mission that was attached to Tito’s partisans. Tito’s presence loomed large during this period and, with Churchill’s direct emissary Fitzroy Maclean attached to his Headquarters, supplies to partisans were given high priority. Tito himself, now Marshal of Yugoslavia, had been forced out of his Jajce Headquarters in January by a German drive and had set up a temporary camp in a the woods en route to Drvar, where he would establish a new base. Fitzroy Maclean, who had been visiting Cairo, returned to the Tito camp at this point, taking with him not only a personal letter from Churchill, but Churchill’s son Randolph. Unable to land at their usual airstrip, which was in the hands of the Germans, they decided to parachute in to Bosanski Petrovac, in Bosnia, and for this purpose two experienced despatchers
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were borrowed from 624 Squadron to help ‘despatch’ the party of seven. They flew in daylight, their Dakota escorted by twelve Thunderbolt fighter aircraft and accompanied by two Italian bombers carrying additional supplies.
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To parachute in during daylight hours and with such an escort was almost unprecedented and emphasised the priority given to the Maclean
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Mission and the high regard in which Tito was held. Churchill delivered a speech the following month to the House of Commons, praising the partisan leader in glowing terms. It was therefore somewhat embarrassing that the BBC continued to call Tito ‘General’, when he had in fact been elevated to ‘Marshal of Yugoslavia’ by the communist-led resistance in November 1943. A signal from Maclean’s Mission in late January 1944 read:

“Why does BBC always call Tito General and not Marshal?”

Followed up three weeks later by:

“Have still received no answer to question

BBC still call Tito General

Can you find whether acting on instructions from F/O [Foreign Office] and if so reason for these instructions.”
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Tito, in his woodland camp, was more concerned about practical matters – many of his men were marching through the winter snow with nothing but rags wrapped around their feet, and he was naturally preoccupied with the supply of boots so that his men could be mobilised and their hardship eased. A series of exchanges between Cairo and the GEISHA Mission in Croatia between 22
^nd
and 30
^th
January shows the priority given to Tito’s request:

22
^nd
: “Tito has ordered boots with overriding priority above other sorties…”

29
^th
: “Explosives for you are high priority after immediate loads of boots. On specific instructions from Tito, boots RPT boots must be delivered before all else…”

30
^th
“Fully appreciate lack sorties your area. Boots are only priority at moment on Tito’s specific request. We are fixing explosive loads for you as soon as boots are exhausted…”

31
^st
: “Tito’s boot sorties almost cleared then explosives to you top priority…”

So it must have been some relief to the GEISHA Mission when, on the 1
^st
February, the Storey, Fairweather, Edwards and Chalk crews arrived overhead at Zvecevo, near the Hungarian border, with their supplies and the long-awaited explosives. As for the boots, because of a shortage of Allied aircraft, some were dropped by an Italian Savoia-Marchetti bomber, which was in service as an Allied supply aircraft following the armistice. Fitzroy Maclean remembered one of these drops because, along with the boots, the aircraft delivered Andrew Maxwell of the Scots Guards, a personal friend of his, who apparently: “Dropped from a great height, followed by a free-drop of several hundred pairs of boots, which had passed him at high speed, missing him by inches”.
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Maxwell was lucky on that occasion, but a few months later a member of Basil Davidson’s SAVANNA
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reception group was killed when a sack of boots, free-dropped from a Halifax, thudded down on to him as he waited by the fires.
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Balkan targets benefitted from the poor weather conditions during the first two weeks of February because, when sorties planned for the priority targets in northern Italy were cancelled by the Met Officer, all available aircraft were switched to Balkan operations, which was the case on the 10
^th
February when the Storey crew were one of four given a SPINSTER
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supply drop north of the Drin river. The crews were briefed on a primary and secondary target within the same area, the drops being for Wing Commander Tony Neel
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in one valley and for Squadron Leader Arthur ‘Andy’ Hands in a neighbouring valley. Confusion at the reception end of the drop meant that when Neel’s group heard aircraft overhead and raced to the top of the hill to dig their fires from under the snow and get them alight, they found that Hands already had his fires burning and was receiving all the supplies. Things were not much better for the aircraft overhead. The Dunphy crew, the first to arrive, reported being fired on from the ground during the drop and although the Storey and Aldred crews dropped without incident, Warrant Officer Pitt in Halifax JN956, who arrived later, also reported machine-gun fire aimed at his aircraft and abandoned the task. The last crew to take off for this area of Albania was that of Flight Sergeant McGugan, in Halifax JN959, and they did not return. Seven crew members, four of whom were Australian, died that night and are buried at the Belgrade War Cemetery. The only survivor was Sergeant Elkes, who was captured and became a prisoner of war. Unaware of the night’s drama in the skies, Captain John Hibberdine, who, with Neel, had struggled to get the signal fires alight only to wait in vain for supplies, vented his frustration at the day’s events in a diary entry: “We all left the dropping ground in a towering rage. To crown it all, the dog peed under Tony’s bed and Otter (wireless op) was found amid a dismantled wireless set trying to persuade it to work.”
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If they were feeling the strain of the situation it is not surprising; just days later, the Germans moved in and, with the local population turning against them, they were forced to gather what belongings they could and move west, spending the next two weeks on the run.

A crew change in February brought Eddie Elkington-Smith to the crew as bomb aimer and second pilot and, during his introduction to the crew, Tom’s words went something like this: “My crew at the next table know this already, but you are new so let me say to you that, here on the ground I will be a great pal to you, but up there in the sky it is just discipline and discipline again. I will require it and I don’t care what you think of me.” Eddie, himself an old hand having completed twenty-six operations, was unimpressed with the ‘new boy’ lecture and tried to speak, but Tom came back: “Don’t interrupt”, and went on to introduce the crew one-by-one. A bit of playful banter then developed with Walter, the most religious of the group being described by Tom as the ‘closest to God’. To which Walter muttered under his breath: “Well, God even likes policemen”, referring to Tom’s pre-war profession. “Yes, and look at me now”, said Tom. “I used to be a policeman in the Midlands and here I am a volunteer in the service of His Majesty.” Much laughter followed and, with the introductions made, Tom winked at the crew “Come on, let’s get lucky. Time for a drink and I’m buying.”
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Tom Storey was probably typical of many Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve (RAFVR) pilots who found their way into the bomber squadrons, in that he was a young man who had done well at school and was at the start of his working life with all the optimism and idealism of youth. His dream, on leaving home, had been to make it as a professional footballer, but that didn’t happen and instead, like his father before him, he did the sensible thing and joined the police force as a constable. A posting to Ludlow in Shropshire led him to a new life and to his wife to be, Rita. He played football for the town in his off-duty hours and grew to love his adopted home – a fondness that was reciprocated. He was unusually tall with wild curly hair, sometimes smoothed down with Brylcream, and kind blue eyes. A quietly spoken Cumbrian, he loved football, life, and most of all Rita. They had a song that they sang together. Tom would start and Rita would join in:

“With someone like you, a pal so good and true,

I’d like to leave it all behind and go and find

Some place that’s known to God alone,

Just a spot to call our own.”

Tom and Rita on their wedding day, July 1943

It was wartime and Ludlow was a town buzzing with the ebb and flow of military personnel stationed nearby. Tom went off to join the RAF in April 1941 and Rita joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force as a wireless operator, proving herself particularly fast and accurate when it came to receiving Morse code messages. So, after initial training in Newcastle, she was posted to the wireless station at Chicksands Priory, where she spent long hours receiving messages to pass to the Bletchley Park code-breaking team. They were both part of the war effort.

“We’ll find perfect peace, where joys never cease

Out there beneath a kindly sky

We’ll build a sweet little nest, somewhere in the west

And let the rest of the world go by”
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For Tom, the RAF gave him the opportunity to fly in every respect. He went to Canada to do his initial training and life became full of new and interesting experiences – he loved it, and felt a real sense of purpose. The invisible ceiling that tended to keep young men like him in trade and commercial jobs had been lifted and his dream of doing something truly adventurous was within reach. The adventure was a serious one though, and it required of him a level of skill and maturity that, in normal circumstances, took a lifetime to acquire. Being a team player by nature, he took very seriously the responsibility of flying six fellow crew members on dangerous missions night after night. By January 1944, the crew had 30 missions under their belt, and despite some nasty situations, their luck was holding.

Luck for Major Gordon Layzell, dropped into Albania by the Storey crew in November 1943, had not held. In early February, Lieutenant Colonel Norman Wheeler’s party were occupying two houses in the mountainside village of Staravecka when the house in which Layzell had been staying suffered a chimney fire. Thinking that the house was on fire, he quickly gathered his kit and slung his machine gun over his shoulder. The gun went off. Marcus Lyon rushed into the room to find that Gordon Layzell had accidentally shot himself in the head. He was tended by Jack Dumoulin, but died in the early hours of the following morning. Tragedy enough, but there was more. The aircraft bringing in the supplies, Halifax BB444 of 624 Squadron, piloted by the newly-arrived Flight Sergeant Tennant, suffered engine failure while circling for the drop, lost height, and crashed into a mountain.
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Flight Sergeant Baker in the rear turret was the only survivor, and by the time Wheeler and Lyon had made their way to the crash site, someone had already stolen his boots. The dead airmen, who had been operational for less than a week, were buried at the crash site and later reinterred in the Tirana Park Memorial Cemetery. Gordon Layzell was buried in the corner of a meadow close to the village of Staravecka and also reinterred in the Tirana Park Cemetery.
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