THE MAN WHO FLEW IN H FOR HARRY
· START OF A MISSION:
A Bileting is loaded with fuel and bombe for Ha'night mission. This wAJ, the daily scene at the airfields of East Anglia as the bombing offensiva moved to a climax. Then, across the dusk aky, the long lines of planes would struggle cast and south..........
(Continued from Fare 0)
There was
ulinding light
and then, for Middleton, coin- plote darkness. I'm bit' the
others heard him say on the inter-com. He slumped forward
SKINNER was wound-
ed in the tata on Turin and was awarded the D.F.C.
HYDER
ilo was Kiddleton's co-pilot ana WON
the D.F.M. for his part in the raid.
Ron Middleton's last order
for the third time.
over the stick. He was badly tunnet, lurched across the target the wounded in the body and Icgs; blood was pouring from the socket where his right eye had been.
Not until the bombs were zone and they wero climbing away from the target did Middleton The String kanged forward and Hyder look at each other
the and size up their situation. into a dive straight at target, hurling everything for- ward inside the fuselage, while the slipstream, converted sud- donly into an icy gule, tore through the smashed windscreen
through screamed and fuselage like 2 tornado,
Desperate
tu
The
Hyder, badly injured himself, fought wrench Middleton slick and regain clear of the
The rest of the crew, control.
and blasted by the slipstream unaware of Hyder's struggles in the cockpit, braced themselves for the crash.
They were down to 500ft. be- fure Hyder was able to free the controls
of fiddleton's dead weight and level out, Caught in hail of anti-aircraft fire, the Stirling was hit again and again, Gough, in the rear turret, and Skinner, at the radio, were both wounded.
Hyder ducked his head into the slipstream and tugged desper- Intely at the controls, fighting for altitule.
At once Middleton saw that Hyder too was badly wounded. "Get back to the rest bunk to have your wounds dressed," 1:0 ordered. "I cop her going."
continuance of bomber operations depended on the determination of pilots to bomb their targets and get their air- craft back to base.
came
He had completed
volunteered for the Turin mission,
GOUGH four of duty, but
his own chances of escaping was too low for their parochûter wero infinitesimal.
But he reckoned without the Intense loyalty of his crew- the loyalty which his own ag tions and character had done no mucha to inspire.
to open properly, or they got out safely but died of exposure during the night.
Their bodies, attached to open parachutes, were washed up next day.
French Ryde, found that he had missed guns they crossed the
As the five survivors, twirled Meanwhile Mackle const south of Boulogne and the order.
allently down to safety the Mackie, who had stood behind watched the Silling erish into they then nimed for Kent. In 15 half-drogged, half-carried
badly wouned Hyder to the him to help him fly the aircraft the sea a mile off shore. minutes they would be there.
Perhaps in those last seconds of a dying alteraft there WAS
guide them throngh the moun- taina.
the long flight Then came ocross France, while the fight
hatch and wrapped his fingers all the way from Turin, refused
round. the engineer kept a continual check The night was still dark, but firmly
parachute to leave him. So, too, feeling on their petrol consumption and the moon had risen and release handle before pushing that he might still be able to estimated their chances of occasional shafts of
stiver him out. Skinner went forward help him, did Jeffery, the flight Southern reaching
England. plereed the high cloud and just in time to see Hyder's up- engineer. we ought to reach the French glistened on the water. No one turned face disappear through cast," he announced at length, spoke as the mules fleked by, the hatch. Gugh Cameron and "but I doubt if we'll get across They had been airborne for Royde followed, and then it was the Channel,"
eight and a half hours.
The Skinner's turn. In spite of his lime was a quarter to three.
made a good cxit. Injuries he
A darker line on the water chend of them told them that
sight. England was
There was no luht to guide them. As Middleton, Hyder, and Mackie pointed the coastline out to each other the Inter-com sprong to life. It was Jellery.
Kept on
Ho called Royde. "Give me a course to steer to cross the Alps, Then jettison everything you can, We'll start climbing and see how high she'll go,"
Royde
with the up course and then went back into the fuselage to supervise the They bunk. jettisoning of equipment,
Once galo there was the throw out chunks of armour plating, oxygen bottles, ammuni- temptation lo lako the casy way,
spore scals, the to bring the aircraft down safe on, flares, comera. the fire extin- ly in France, or bala out, with- Royde out risking the Channel crossing guishers and sexlar!.
But In a crippled aircraft. wont round with « Areman's
Middleton
At no kept on. chopping off things to
ntage did any one of his crew question his decisions, even mentally. They had completo faith in him.
Hyder, his left leg torn open, limped back through the tuselage and collapsed on the Jeffery and Skinner dried and cleaned his head wounds with his torn hands gauze, dressed wa and decided that his leg needed a tourniquet.
But Hyder refused. isn't time," be, suld.
bad,
"There axe. "f want fettison.
to go back and help Ron."
And he got up from the bunk and shambled forward, head bloodstains. on his down, the
bright flying suit showing up red as they caught the lights on the engineer's panel, Skinner. wounded in the leg himself. could not imagine how Hyder kept standing.
There were several Courses how upen to Middleton, He for could turn south and make
even
All they kept were their parachutes anil their dinghies in case at the last they were forced to bale out or come down in the and.
Hazards
• When there seemed to be nothing movable left. Royde called Middleton: "How are we dolag?"
"She's climbing well." "What about the guns? Two
Shall we jettison
As they climbed clear of the North Africa ovulding a second in the 1a turret have been target Middleton, exerting his crossing of the Alps. But air- shot away. will agulost waves af, uncen- sciousness, began to come to. fields had hardly been
60Inc.
estab-
the rest?"
Jils first words esme hallingly, lished there, and in any case this meant a long sea crossing. mechanically, from where in the back throat: "Are we tou bomby"
Shot away
of ble He could force - Jand some- low to where in Switzerland and face internment, with the possibility of escape back to Britain,
Or,
the aircraft still responded fairly well and there WDS # chance of clearing the mile of their appalling mountains, and if he could with, injuries, these two men FLOA
stand the pain from his eye and coaxed to crippled Stirling the icy slipstream, he could start back towards the target at back towards England, risking 1,500ft., while Royde, still wait- the German night-lighter patrols ing in the bomb-well, prepared over France, hoping to get down once again to drop the bombs, somewhere on the flat plains of Meanwhile thuds of light flak France if anything went wrong spaltered along the fuselage continuously.
The lost course was the mos hazardous, but all his bolning The Stirling, budly holed in pointed towards it. It was so one wing, half its rear turret tempting to take the easy way shot away, with four men cut. to make for a neutral wounded and the whole crew haven when one's alreraft was buffeted as though in a wind- dumanged. But he knew that
to
Obsessed with; the need селлекте fuel. Middleton: throttled tack
they បទ *
n
another
Will-power
As these Ave men fell away from the Suring, and their parachutes opened, they saw the aircraft bank gently and turn out to sea. What happened next
five "We've got minules," he said. " think must be conjecture.' can guarantee that.. But not ton."
Clipped on
Five minutes. That would appranched Paris and began get them to the coast, but no long tet-down aimed at the further. It meant baling out English coast. This was the
as soon as they got there. Give best way to make use of their me my parachute," called Mid- lleton. His voice was thick height.
and muted now. difficult to But over Northern Franeb understand. Royde passed him Skinner, working the radio, marw his parachute, and they all a flash of light through the clipped on their 'chutes. astrodome above him. Search- lights. The plane was down to Skinner, at the radio, went off below 7,000ft, now.
and 12 the inter-com to get a bearing, probing beams were holding It might be important to know. them steady, like a series of exactly where they were. tripcds.
Boxed in It hurts
"Yes, George," *camo the whlaper, "carry on. But, try not to talk to me. when I answer."
They had a four-hour flight ahead of them; if their petol held out,
with all kinds of hazards facing them on the way and at the end, But with the aircraft lightened by the drop- ping of the bomb load, the consumption of petrol, and the ruthless jettisoning of equipment, they climbed to 14,000ft, and crossed the Alps safely, thread, ing their way for the second time through the higher peaks, Middleton was almost blind now, Hyder was weak from loss of blood, and both men Wera almost paralysed with cold, no Markio, the front gun- nor, came back to help them steer the compass course and
BCB
Middleton called the crew again, his voice allenuated to the marest whisper. "AS SUOTI as we're over land. .. .. Ishali turn parallel to the coast ... and give the order to bale out. Soon the flak found them.
When everyone has gone Bursts of shrapnel rattled on the mainplane, and Middleton called shall turn the aircraft out to and bale out` myself. on his last reserves of strength don't want to risk the alr to throw the Stirling clear. All craft crashing into houses." his plans for conserving, petrol evaporated as the defendere As they crossed the coast boxed him in with accurate fro Jeffery called Middleton. "That's and forced him to swerve and it, Ron, She'll die out any time
ink and then dive away to the now." right to escape the blinding searchlight beams. He came out of the dive at last in merciful darknest, but at GOOF.
And now to cross the Channel.
"Prepare to bale out," called Middleton. He took the Surling a quarter of a milo inland and then turned east-north-east. Half a minute later he called again. "All right—jump, every- body":
•
In spite of its severe battering the Stirling was - atiil flying strongly, and their only worry Skinner, switching back to the was fuel To avoid the coastal Inter-com to give a bearing to
THAT SWELTERING WEEK-END....
It was two months before the wreck of the Stirling broke up anul·released the last member of the crow. Middle- ton's body war washed up off Shakespeare Cliff, Dover, on February 1, 1943.
argument among the skele- ten crew-the first time que of
A fortnight earlier his memory Middleton's decisions had ever had been immortalised by the been
queried, Middleton.
award of the Victoria Cross. dying man himself. Insisted with " devotion to duly in the his last flicker of will-power face of overwhelming odds," that they go. And Macitle and tald the citation, is unsurpass Jellery could not find it in them- ed in the annals selves to disobey him further. Air Force." They got ready to jump, but as they did so the engines finally sucked the petrul tanks dry,
Too late
Middleton must have realised that his injuries were serious and that he might not recover from When the engines of the big them. He had probably survived bomber cut, the aircraft did not this for on wili-power alone --- alide enslly. Probably it lunged the determination to get his forward as Middleton tried to Intent now on crew back safely, and the alp keep control. craft as well if he could. He making a successful ditching. was equally determined, now,
Meanwhile, driven by a last not to risk the lives of civilans. He therefore gave everyone time order from Middleton, Mackle Jeffery Jumped. But it to get clear and then turned the end
Stirling out to sea, knowing that was too late. Either the aircraft
NEW-in Design,
of the Royal
So died Ron Middleton, the lonely outback Australian who found à comradeship unequalled. afraid, and The man who was who conquered his fear.
COPYRIGHT:
Beaverbrook Nowspapers
∙1961
NEXT WEEK: 'A vital, desperate task'
-(London Express Service),
Speed, Styling-
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Cummings
"Look, Lord Besverbrook 1. He must be getting as into the Common Market! Continental weat
・already!".
Gondon „Expresa Barvico.