THE CHINA MAIL, SEPTEMBER 24, 1941.
NIGHT FIGHTERS WORK LIKE POLICE CARS
(By A "Daily Telegraph" Reporter)
ONE MORNING, at a time when most people were getting up, I watched a night fighter pilot and his air gunner go into the mess and switch on the wireless.
All through the night they had been "at the ready" or in the air helping in the job of giving battle to enemy raiders. Now they wanted to hear the full results of the defensive activity in which they had participated.
Four enemy bombers destroyed last night. Ono, a Junk- ers 88, exploded and caught fire after the first burst. There was another explosion after the BC. cond burst, and the starboard en. gine blew up. After a third and final burst the whole aircraft burst into flames. stalled. broke two and crashed into the sea,
Into
HOW ‘AMY'
MET DEATH
Miss Pauline Gower, cummand- ing officer of the women's section The pair listened unemotion-of the Air Transport Auxiliary. ally Then they went to break- told a literary luncheon how Amy
st, bath and bed.
Johnson met her death.
That bulletin summarised uccessful results of our fighters in recent months.
the
might
men, all-
When all goes well, two tting back to back in an binck Defiant, travel unerringly to the enemy raiders and
troy them.
"It fell to my lot to check up on her flight," said Miss Gower. "We have absolutely no doubt how she died.
"She was flying in icy conditions above clouds so heavy that she could not find a breɗk to enable de-
her to come down. She was run- There is a period of patient Ding out of petrol, and must have decided to come down through the abrupt stalking and then comes
clouds. It was just bad luck that action. The pressure of a tiny
she happened to be over the button, an instantaneous burst of
She baled out, and, had fire from the guns, and another water, German bomber has met its doom, she been above land, would have
been here to-day. Usually it does not even stag- ger; it is blown to bits.
This nightly task is being de- veloped with ever increasing offelency.
The men concerned are already accepting it us mere routine,
The place from which I write accommodates hundred-per-cent, night fighter squadrons. They have no other attention. They man Delants and Beaufighters.
it
The Defiant squadron has particularly proud record, and only a few hours before I ar- rived its wing-commander had received from the King his D.F.C.|
Ever-Growing Efficiency
This squadron, including period in which it was on
to
"In baling out of the type of aircraft she was flying it was often necessary
jettison the door, which, as it came down, might have caused the rumour that there was a passenger in the aircraft,"
EXTERMINATION BATTALIONS
"The Germans are landing groups of five to ten saboteurs with parachutes in the uniform of Soviet militiamen, to damage lines of communication, says u
ROBEY RAISES £1,000,000
on
George Robey, the air in "Monday Night at Eight,' said that already
he
to
had managed raise. £1,000,- 000 for war charities.
With what he raised in the last war, this brings the total sum realised by "The Prime Minister of Mirth" to one and a half mil- lion pounds.
000000
"LONELY SOLDIER,"
A
MARRIED, WAR BIGAMIST
lonely
#1
soldier" — with wife and six children-appealed for girls to write to him and bigamously married girl who did.
The girl. Miss Edith Grimes, a London Civil Servant, had ans- wered his appeal, and the two wrote to each other regularly.
The "lonely soldier," John Ste- wart (36). of Glasgow, was wounded at Calais, and after dis- charge froin the Army "married" Miss Grimes at St. Mary's Churcli, Tottenham.
was
It was stated at the Old Bailey
when recently,
Stewart charged with
bigamy, that alter the couple had lived together for a
Russian High Command com- month Stewart disappeared leav- the munique quoted by A. T. Cholering a note saying he was ill with dayton, "Daily Telegraph" correspon-consumption.
Aghter operations, has brought dent ip Moscow.
down 96 enemy aircraft. Eight Extermination battalions have Then the police found that he members have gained the D.F.C., been formed in the rear of our had returned to his wife and chil-! eight others the D.F.M., two armies to destroy these para-dren in Glasgow. with bars.
chutists. The People's Commissar
A gunner said to me: "I might for Internal Affairs has been Stewart was bound over say we are the highest develop-charged with their direction. two years.
ment of Scotland Yard's Flying Squad idea. You know how the policemen patrol London in their cars and are suddenly or- dered by radio to make for specified point. Well, our work is rather like that.
2
"We are in touch all the time with control headquarters, which by a variety of wonderful devices is keeping track of marauders."
Shortly after the last of the night fighters had returned before dawn I saw a squadron of Spit- Ares approaching in beautifully
Mother Of Six
Sent To Gaol
AN ARMY SEPARATION allowance of £2 15s.
neat formation. They were taking a week for herself and her six children, aged from over from their colleagues of the 2 to 17, is drawn by Mrs. Elizabeth Wotton. Her night.
Day and night now, without husband is in Malta on active service. cessation, the British give battle in the air.
V
One of the children stole some money in an escapade. In a moment of weakness, Mrs. Wotton kept it and spent some of it on clothes for the
MUSCOVITE TOUCH children.
IN ROSS-SHIRE VILLAGE
The Bench; at: Stratford, Lon- don, sentenced, her to a month's hard jabourdie
for
The Chairman oald the Pro- bation Officer would attend tq that-gido: of the case. He sup.... look posed, the P.A.C. - would after the children,"
The Chairman, Mr. C. W. Hodg-' son, said that Mrs. Wotton's seven- teen-year-old daughter, who had just started work, would be ableNeeded It So Badly" to look after herself. The Justices regarded it as a very serious case,
Most people know how the rumour of Russians passing through the country in the last war spread after a troop train had stopped at an important function, and one which had to be dealt to receiving £10 knowing it to and tea was given to the men,
with severely
Mrs. Wotton, who pleaded guilty
have been stolen, stated in court that she knew she ought to have
"But I wanted the money so [-badly," "she said. "My husband's allowance does not keep the children and me. I know I have done wrong."
who, speaking Gaelic, said they The police said that Mrs. Wot-returned the money. came from "Ross-shire", it was ton held a good character, misheard as "Russia." But all. After hearing the sentence, Mrs. readers may not know the follow- | Wotton lost her self-control" and ing facts:
| cried; "But why that? What about The troops were Lovat Scouts my children?"!! en route for the Home Countles.
She was assisted to the cells. Detective-Sergeant Tresidder By the way, there is a village in Later the Warrant Sergeant snid said that because of the children Ross-shire called! Moscow, and there are some farmsteads called that Mrs. Wotton, whose home Mrs. Wotton could not go to work Rushaw, address; is Earl's Cottages, Wood- herself and the Army allowance To add to the Muscovite associa- lane, Dagenham, was anxious was her sole income, excepting the tions (and confusions), a stream about her children's welfare few shillings earned by the eldest which passes by these farmhouses Sho wanted a message sent to girl. ISTE AN
has been christened "Volga." It her seventeen-year-old daughter Thero, was no doubt sho was in only needs the blacksmith to be so that she would go home and soo straitened circumstances, called Stalin and the analogy to the children, at home alone, The Bench made en order re- the would be still more incredibly except for a neighbour looking turning £4 of the £10 true..
after them.
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