Mosquito: Menacing the Reich: Combat Action in the Twin-engine Wooden Wonder of World War II (56 page)

38
The Mossie
, Mosquito Aircrew Association, Vol.21, January 1999.

39
Flying Officer F. M. ‘Bud’ Fisher DFC and his navigator Flight Sergeant Les Hogan DFM were prevented from attacking the target by the balloon barrage bombed the town from 200ft. (Fisher and Hogan were KIA on the night of 29/30 September 1943 when their Mosquito crashed near West Raynham returning from the raid on Bochum). Flying Officer Don C. Dixon, an Australian from Brisbane and his navigator Flying Officer W. A. Christensen, a fellow Australian from New South Wales, attempted three runs on the target. They were also prevented from bombing by the balloons and intense flak and they dropped their bombs on a goods train at Lastrup. Pilot Officer Ronald Massie and Sergeant George Lister who were last seen as the formation entered cloud prior to reaching the target crashed near Diepholz and were killed.

40
By March 1945 Roy Ralston was CO of 139 Squadron and still managed to fly on operations. He had been awarded the DSO for ‘outstanding leadership and determination’ and he was awarded a bar to his DSO after his 83rd op, promoted to wing commander and given command of 1655 Mosquito Training Unit at Marham. At the end of the war Ralston was listed for a permanent commission but a medical examination revealed that he had TB and he was invalided out of the RAF in 1946. Wing Commander Ralston DSO* DFC DFM AFC died on 8 October 1996.

41
Flight Lieutenant William S. D. ‘Jock’ Sutherland and Flying Officer George Dean in a 139 Squadron Mosquito were seen to bomb their target but both crew were killed when they crashed at Wroxham railway station. They had flown into high voltage overhead electric cables when attempting to land at RAF Coltishall on their return. Flying Officers Alan Rae DFM and Kenneth Bush died when their Mosquito crashed while they tried to land at Marham on one engine.

42
Wing Commander Reynolds was awarded a bar to his DSO, Flight Lieutenant Ted Sismore and Squadron Leader Bill Blessing received the DSO, Bud Fisher the DFC and his navigator, Flight Sergeant Hogan the DFM.

43
At 1655 MTU all pilots had to complete a laid down syllabus of 30 hours flying - ten in the Dual Flight and 20 in the Bomber Flight, the latter complete with navigator. No pilot was allowed to touch the controls of a Mosquito until he had 1,000 hours as first pilot under his belt and had been selected to fly Mosquitoes.

Chapter 2

44
Work began on the Mosquito prototypes, the first (E-0234, later W4050) flying on 25 November 1940. By January 1941 W4050 was proving faster than a Spitfire in tests at 6,000ft, and by February it was recording speeds of around 390 mph at 22,000ft. PR prototype W4051 was the second Mosquito completed at Salisbury Hall. While it retained the short engine nacelles and tailplane of the prototype, it differed in having longer wings (by 20 inches), and carried three vertical cameras and one oblique. At first the camera mounts were made of steel, but these were later changed to wood, as these helped reduce camera vibration and improve image quality. The nightfighter prototype became the second Mosquito to fly when the fuselage originally intended for W4051 was used to replace W4050’s fuselage, which had fractured at Boscombe Down in a tail wheel incident. W405l received a production fuselage instead, which later enabled the prototype to fly on operations - it completed its maiden flight on 10 June 1941.

45
W4064-72.

46
W4054 and W4055 followed on 22 July and 8 August respectively. Beginning in September, No.1 PRU received seven more production PR.Is - W4056 and W4058-63 (W4056 FTR in April 1942. W4057 became the B.V bomber prototype. W4058 failed to return from a sortie to Oslo on 17 October 1942). Four of these (W4060-63) were later modified with increased fuel tankage for long range operations and two, (W4062 and W4063) were tropicalised. W4060 was seriously damaged in a flying accident in July 1942. W4067 FTR on 27 July 1942. W4089 FTR in July 1942. The standard Mosquito camera installation at the time consisted of four vertical cameras. These were the F24 Universal oblique camera for day and night photography. The F52 20- or 36-inch high altitude day reconnaissance camera (which entered service in May 1942) and the American K-17 survey and mapping camera with 6-inch lens, plus a single F24 camera mounted in the lower fuselage. The fit depended on the type of sortie flown, with one of the most widely used being a single K-17 (or K8AB with 12-inch lens) forward and a split vertical F52 installation behind the wing, and an F24 oblique camera facing to port. This was sometimes changed to a split vertical F52 camera installation forward, two standard vertical F52 cameras and one F24 aft of the wing. The split vertical camera installation was basically two cameras (F24s or F52s) mounted at slightly differing angles to double the field of view, while retaining the 60% overlap needed for stereoscopic coverage of the target area. The split vertical F52 36-inch camera installation gave the PR.I lateral coverage of three miles from 35,000ft and 255 mph. Besides these installations, some late model PR Mosquitoes were fitted with two forward-facing F24 14-inch lens cameras, one in each dummy 50-gallon drop tank, for low-level photography.

47
Each of the early PR.Is was named after a different variety of strong liquor, W4055 being christened
Benedictine
and others
Whiskey
and
Vodka
,
Drambuie
,
Cointreau
and
Creme de Menthe
.

48
Rupert Clerke had been a flight commander in 79 Squadron in 1940 flying Hurricane I fighters. He was awarded a one third share in downing a He 111 off Sunderland on 9 August and a one fifth share for a Bf 110 and a Do 17 ‘probable’ over the North Sea on 15 August. On 28 August he scored his first outright victory when he destroyed a He 59 and he was also awarded a Bf 109E ‘probable’. He returned to fighters early in 1942 and became a flight commander in 157 Squadron flying the Mosquito II. His second outright victory followed on 30 September when he destroyed a Ju 88A-4 of I/KG6 off the Dutch coast. Two more victories followed in 1943 when he was CO of 125 Squadron.

49
W4051, W4055, W4059 and W4061.

50
Two days earlier a PR.I was sent out to Malta for trials in the Mediterranean. However, the aircraft piloted by Flying Officer Kelly was written off in a crash-landing on arrival at Luqa. A second Mosquito, piloted by Pilot Officer Walker arrived safely on Malta on 17 January and after a series of sorties over Italy, it was lost on 31 March after a mission to Sicily. Badly shot up by Bf 109s, Pilot Officer Kelly and Sergeant Pike nursed the ailing Mosquito to Hal Far, where it crashed and burnt out. Both crew survived.

51
In a talk to de Havilland workers at Hatfield on 11 March.

52
Production was halted for 4 weeks and final repairs were not completed for several months. A post-war American estimate said that the production loss was almost 2,300 vehicles. Just 1 aircraft (a Wellington) was lost but 367 French people were killed, 341 were badly injured and 9,250 people lost their homes.

53
On 3 April 1942 W4056 was shot down over Stavanger and the two crew taken prisoner.

54
DD615, 620, 659 and W4089 and DK284 and 311 respectively.

55
Maschinenfabrik Augsburg Nürnberg Aktiengesellschaft.

56
Above All Unseen
by Edward Leaf. PSL. 1997.

57
W4060 was subsequently repaired and was lost with David O’Neill and David Lockyer on 20 February 1943 when it was badly hit by flak and crashed at Loddefjord.

58
The New Wooden Walls in Bombers Fly East
by Bruce Sanders, (Herbert Jenkins Ltd 1943).

59
At this time 1 PRU was responsible direct to Headquarters Coastal Command.

60
The New Wooden Walls in Bombers Fly East
by Bruce Sanders, (Herbert Jenkins Ltd 1943).

61
In reality PRU aircrew who arrived at Vaenga some weeks later found that the accommodation, half barrack block and half country house, quickly christened the ‘Kremlin’, was not only infested with mice but that it was also the target of numerous air raids. The Russians therefore lived in underground shelters. When the PRU detachment moved into its own shelter they later found that it was the morgue! See
Above All Unseen
by Edward Leaf. (PSL. 1997).

62
The unit disbanded on 18 October and the personnel sailed for Scotland five days later.

63
DK310 was retained by the Swiss, who later used it as a turbine test bed aircraft. Wooll returned to flying, as a test pilot for de Havilland in Canada.

64
Three of them were equipped with Spitfires, while H and L Flights at Leuchars were merged to form 540 (Mosquito) Squadron, under the command of Squadron Leader M. J. B. Young DFC. 544 Squadron (which was equipped mostly with Wellingtons and Spitfires, but eventually replaced these in March 1943 with PR IV and PR IX Mosquitoes) was formed under the command of Squadron Leader W. R. Alcott DFC. In December 1942 two PR IVs (DZ411 and 419) joined 540 Squadron, followed, during the first three months of 1943, by a further 27 PR IVs - all conversions of existing B IVs. PRU training unit, 8(PR) OTU was also established at Fraserburgh, Aberdeenshire. Squadron Leader Lord David Douglas Hamilton OBE, son of Wing Commander the Duke of Hamilton, who Rudolf Hess flew to Scotland to visit in May 1941, was its CO. David Douglas Hamilton was lost with Phil Gatehouse not long after D-Day.

65
The famous daylight raid was led by Wing Commander L. C. Slee of 49 Squadron. Some 88 Lancasters made a direct attack on the factory and the other 8 bombing a nearby transformer station, which supplied the plant with electricity. The route was flown at tree top level with four aircraft being damaged by birds. Bombing was carried out from 7,500 to 2,500ft and 140 tons of bombs were dropped.

66
The factory was bombed again by 290 Halifaxes, Stirlings and Lancasters of 3, 4, 6 and 8 Groups on 19/20 June 1943.

67
The New Wooden Walls in Bombers Fly East
by Bruce Sanders, (Herbert Jenkins Ltd 1943).

68
Dédeé’ and her father Frédéric had formed the Comet line in 1941. 15 January would have been her 19th crossing to Spain.

69
During the ‘Wooden Horse’ epic escape on 29 October 1943, as the lightest man in the camp Mac McKay was chosen to be carried out to the horse as third man. His duty was to cover up the tunnel entrance on the parade ground while the two escapers went down the tunnel. The third escaper was already in the tunnel to dig out the last few feet before breaking through outside the wire. Mac covered up the tunnel entrance and was carried back in the horse to the hut where it was kept. As a result of this daring plan, Michael Codner, Eric ‘Bill’ Williams and Oliver Philpot escaped to freedom via Sweden, eventually returning to the UK.

70
Which began as B IV Series II aircraft, with 1,565hp two-stage- supercharged Merlin 61 engines in place of the 21/22. The PR.VIII had a greatly improved ceiling, which allowed PR Mosquitoes to operate at high altitude for the first time. DK324, which first flew on 20 October 1942, was a prototype for the Mk.VIII version, and it reached 540 for testing on 28 November 1942. DZ342 arrived on 15 December 1942, followed in 1943 by DZ364 on 22 January, DZ404 on 4 February and DZ424 on 28 March.

71
This aircraft was subsequently lost, along with Flight Sergeant M. Custance and his navigator, on 18 March 1943.

72
Above All Unseen
by Edward Leaf. PSL. 1997.

73
Raids continued against secret weapons’ sites in France, including the V-2 preparation and launch site at Watten, which was bombed by over 180 bombers of the USAAF on 27 August. A PRU sortie three days later revealed that the target was not completely destroyed. A follow-up raid was flown on 7 September, which devastated the complex and forced the Germans to concentrate development at Wizernes. On 17 July 1944 16 Lancasters of 617 Dam Busters Squadron (with a Mosquito and a Mustang as marker aircraft) aimed 12,000lb
Tallboy
earthquake bombs with 11-second delay on the huge concrete dome, 20ft thick. It lay on the edge of a chalk quarry protecting rocket stores and launching tunnels that led out of the face of the quarry pointing towards London. One
Tallboy
that apparently burst at the side of the dome exploded beneath it, knocking it askew. Another caused part of the chalk cliff to collapse, undermining the dome, with part of the resulting landslide also blocking four tunnel entrances, including the two that were intended for the erected V-2s. Ironically, though the construction was not hit the whole area around was so badly ‘churned up’ that it was unapproachable and the bunker jeopardised from underneath. The Germans abandoned the site and the V-2s were pulled back to The Hague in Holland where, in September they began firing them from mobile launchers.

74
PR Mosquito production was also at last beginning to take precedence over the bomber variant, with 90 PR.IX models being ordered compared with just 54 of the B.IX. The PR IX was powered by two 1,680hp Merlin 72/73s or 76/77s, and had a fuel capacity of 860 gallons, including two 50-gallon drop tanks under the wings. When it carried two 200-gallon tanks, its total fuel capacity was just over 1,000 gallons. Range with underwing tanks was 2,450 miles at a cruising speed of 250 mph.

75
Early in November 1943, Bill White and Ron Prescott were detailed to photo map the Azores, which belonged to neutral Portugal. They were on their way home by 8 December. Their photos of the Azores were good and after one more op, to Norway, Bill and Ron were transferred to the Photo Recce OTU at Dyce. They had made 63 daylight operational flights and had been honoured by the King, Ron being awarded the DFM and Bill the DFC.

76
See
The Mosquito Log
by Alexander McKee. Souvenir Press. 1988. Eighteen months later on his from to England Aston got straight into a Mosquito and flew it without any refresher training whatsoever. He continued to fly Mosquitoes on and off up to the end of 1949 when he graduated from the Empire Test Pilot School and he began a new career as an airline pilot.