McEntee-Taylor - From Colonial Warrior to Western Front Flyer : the Five Wars of Sydney Herbert Bywater Harris

I would like to thank Caroline Maxwell BSc MBA
for all her hard work in preparing the index for the book

First published in Great Britain in 2015 by
Pen & Sword Aviation
an imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street
Barnsley
South Yorkshire
S70 2AS

Copyright Carole McEntee-Taylor 2015

ISBN: 978 1 47382 359 4
EPUB ISBN: 978 1 47385 191 7
PRC ISBN: 978 1 47385 198 6

The right of Carole McEntee-Taylor to be identified as the Author of
this Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical
including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and
retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing.

Typeset in Ehrhardt by
Mac Style Ltd, Bridlington, East Yorkshire
Printed and bound in the UK by CPI Group (UK) Ltd,
Croydon, CRO 4YY

Pen & Sword Books Ltd incorporates the imprints of Pen & Sword
Archaeology, Atlas, Aviation, Battleground, Discovery, Family
History, History, Maritime, Military, Naval, Politics, Railways, Select,
Transport, True Crime, and Fiction, Frontline Books, Leo Cooper,
Praetorian Press, Seaforth Publishing and Wharncliffe.

For a complete list of Pen & Sword titles please contact
PEN & SWORD BOOKS LIMITED
47 Church Street, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, S70 2AS, England
E-mail:
Website: www.pen-and-sword.co.uk

Contents

Prologue

France, June 1940

Y oure getting too old for this, Harris old chap, a wry smile formed on Sydney Herbert Bywater Harris lips as he realised what hed said. Sydney never thought he would admit to his advancing age but at 58 he really was too old to be trying to outrun the German Blitzkrieg as it spread rapidly across France. With hindsight perhaps he should have been satisfied with the desk job theyd offered him, but no, hed had to force his way into the action even though he really should have known better. On the other hand, he never felt more alive than when the odds were against him and, even though he was exhausted, a part of him was quietly exhilarated by the excitement. At the age when most men would be looking forward to their retirement hed been given one last chance for some fun.

Come on, Harris, we need to get a move on or theyll overrun us. Sydney looked at his companions and nodded. The speed with which the Germans had closed the net was truly frightening. Word had reached them that the majority of the army had made it off at Dunkirk, but there were thousands, like him, stranded and making their way to places like Saint-Nazaire in the hope the navy would be able to rescue them.

It hardly seemed possible that the BEF had collapsed so quickly but now was probably not the time to think about it. He climbed into the staff car and the driver eased in the clutch and shot off. They had no idea how close the Germans were behind them and it wasnt wise to find out.

After the female ATS staff had gone back to England on 12 June it was fairly obvious that things were serious. With little else to do they had made plans to protect the camp. To start with they set up a tank trap on all the nearby roads by stretching steel wire at a 45-degree angle across them. To protect against parachutists dropping in they set up a Bren gun in one truck and twenty men in two other lorries to form a flying column. But at 1pm on the 15th they were told they were leaving. French civilians were sent to other parts of the camp so they couldnt see what was going on and the men began packing up. The first convoy left at 6pm that evening.

As they headed towards Saint-Nazaire they passed other remnants of the BEF. There was little spare room in the car but they still pulled over to pick up a wounded infantryman who gratefully climbed aboard. There was a frightening sense of urgency in the air that intensified as they came closer to the town. The roads were soon crammed with stragglers and their progress slowed to a crawl. He looked round him with a feeling of disbelief. The sights that met his eyes had to be seen to be believed and his heart sank as they drove past an anti-aircraft battery towing two guns behind a tractor, which had obviously been commandeered from a French farm, and several ragged bands of men marching determinedly towards what they hoped was escape. Above their heads the skies were filled with Stukas who constantly menaced the retreating convoy, causing them to abandon their vehicles with increasing frequency and take cover wherever they could.

By the time Sydney reached Saint-Nazaire it was dark but even the lack of light could not hide the chaos that greeted him. On the outskirts of the town there were several fields full of British vehicles deliberately abandoned and wrecked by the escaping troops. Because of confusion as to what the Royal Navy could take, thousands of pounds worth of serviceable equipment, guns, vehicles, tanks and much-needed ammunition would be abandoned in France. Distracted by the sight of so much destruction the sudden sound of anti-tank guns made him jump, but it was only soldiers firing rounds into British vehicles as a way of destroying them.

The town itself was a shambles with broken down and abandoned vehicles littering the roads. Everywhere he looked there were retreating soldiers and airmen. He spotted British, French and Polish within minutes of entering the town. Almost immediately they came to a road block and were told to leave the car and walk as all cars were being destroyed because they couldnt be rescued. All available space on the ships would be for the troops. Above his head he could hear the familiar sound of Stukas whining as they targeted the men on the dock and he looked skyward wondering if there were any RAF left in France or were they all being evacuated like him. A few moments later the reassuring sound of a patrol of Hurricanes could be heard above and he breathed a sigh of relief as they eventually chased the Stukas away. The evacuation would never be successful if they couldnt control the skies above.

He climbed wearily out of the car, leaving it by the side of the road. The wounded infantryman leant on his arm and he helped him to the nearest First Aid Post. As they headed towards the port a group of drunken soldiers swept past them, the men laughing and shouting aggressively. He was about to intervene but they looked to be beyond reason and he thought better of it. The port was no less chaotic with men everywhere and eventually they returned to the town, settled down in an abandoned warehouse and tried to sleep.

The following morning, 17 June, they made their way down to the port where thousands of soldiers, airmen and civilians were queuing as they waited for transport to take them out to HMT Lancastria. Discipline seemed to have broken down with NCOs and men calling each other by their first names and men answering back when given orders. An air of every man for himself permeated the area and when one corporal tried to get Bren gunners to set up ready for the anticipated air attacks the men refused and threatened to throw him in the harbour. However, when the Luftwaffe flew over a few moments later every man who still had a weapon fired it at the German aircraft, although they appeared to have little effect.

Sydney turned his attention back to HMT Lancastria. From where he was standing it looked as if the ship was full with thousands of men already on board. Sighing heavily he resigned himself to having to wait until the next one. Then all hell broke loose. The banshee wail of the Junkers Ju-88 bombers shattered the air and his ears rang with the rapid bursts of the ack-ack guns mingling with the rattle of rifles and steady thudding of the Bren guns. Bombs began dropping everywhere catapulting debris into the air, demolishing buildings and creating large craters. Taking cover behind the nearest building, he frantically scanned the skies hoping to see the RAF, but there was no sign of them. The Junkers had used the cloud cover to their advantage and had the area to themselves. Despite the bombs falling all around him he continued to watch the destructive power of the Junkers, wishing he was up there to do something about them. This thought had only just gone through his mind when the frenetic rattle of machine guns caught his attention. In the distance he could see German aircraft machine-gunning the deck of the