Ian Darling - Amazing Airmen: Canadian Flyers in the Second World War

AMAZING AIRMEN

AMAZING AIRMEN

CANADIAN FLYERS
IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR

IAN DARLING

Copyright Ian Darling, 2009

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

Project Editor: Michael Carroll
Copy Editor: Cheryl Hawley
Design: Courtney Horner
Printer: Webcom

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Darling, Ian, 1948
Amazing airmen : Canadian flyers in the Second World War / by Ian Darling.

Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-55488-424-7

1. World War, 1939-1945--Aerial operations, Canadian. 2. Canada.
Royal Canadian Air Force--Biography. 3. Great Britain. Royal Air Force--Biography.
I. Title.

D792.C2D37 2009 940.544971
C2009-902464-0

2 3 4 5 13 12 11 10 09

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and The Association for the Export of Canadian Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishers Tax Credit program, and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.

Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.

J. Kirk Howard, President

Published by The Dundurn Group
Printed and bound in Canada.

www.dundurn.com

For Jane Ann

CONTENTS

Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on that strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter.

Winston Churchill, My Early Life

With hindsight, I know exactly where and when I started this book. I was driving back to my newspaper in Kitchener at 4:30 p.m., November 11, 2002. I had just attended the funeral for my uncle, George Darling. He was a bomb-aimer on a Halifax bomber during the Second World War, and his pilot, Tom Lane, had delivered the eulogy.

As I drove on Highway 8, just outside of Kitchener, I realized that I didnt know much about what my uncle had done during the war. I knew he had been shot down somewhere in Europe and that he had been a prisoner of war, but I didnt know what happened to his bomber or what ordeals he had suffered. I decided to learn the details and write a story for my newspaper about him and his crew. I pieced the story together by reading his wartime diary and by interviewing Tom, as well as another member of the crew, Roy Macdonald. The Record printed the story a year later, a few days before Remembrance Day, 2003.

I thought I had finished writing about the war. Much to my surprise, I received phone calls and email messages encouraging me to write a book of similar stories. One such message came from Richard Rohmer, a Second World War pilot and a prolific writer. Apparently, I had erred in thinking that I had finished writing about the war.

That was six years ago. Since then, I have spoken to air force veterans who experienced horrific ordeals, and I have interviewed historians and archivists who provided additional information that I needed.

I hope this book is worthy of those who encouraged me to write it. Even more important, I hope it is worthy of the veterans whose stories appear in it.

Ian Darling
Kitchener, Ontario
March 2009

THE CAREER OFFICER

Keith Ogilvie wanted to join the Royal Canadian Air Force, but the air force turned him down. In the pre-war era it wanted university graduates. Ogilvie, who was twenty-four, was more athletic than academic. He had graduated from high school and worked as a clerk in an Ottawa stock brokers office.

Ogilvie decided he would try to join another air force. In August 1939, he submitted his application at the Ottawa office of Britains Royal Air Force. The office recruited him two days later, quickly gave him a medical exam and sent him to England on the ocean liner Letitia.

Within a month of Ogilvies arrival the British government declared war on Germany. When he sent troops into Poland on September 1, 1939, Adolf Hitler demonstrated that he had no interest in what British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain called peace for our time. Hitler wanted to use military force to expand German influence in Europe and around the world. Poland was the first country to fall. The Netherlands, Belgium, and France soon followed.

Keith Ogilvie about 1940.

In September 1940, thousands of German troops assembled in France to invade the south coast of England. Hitlers invasion plan was called Operation Sea Lion. The Germans lined up hundreds of river barges and other boats to take the troops across the English Channel. No invading force had come so close to Englands shores since the Spanish Armada sailed into the English Channel in 1588.

Before Hitler could launch the invasion, Germany needed to control the skies over the Channel. The Luftwaffe had to defeat the RAF so that British aircraft could not attack the invading force.

The British people were grim and tense. The war had reduced the countrys food supply, forcing the government to issue ration coupons for items such as bacon, butter, and sugar. Windows had to be completely covered at night to prevent any light from showing light that could provide navigational assistance to German pilots. Great Britain was dark, literally and emotionally.

Though weaker than Germany, Britain was not defenceless. It could rely on Canada and other Commonwealth countries for assistance. It could call upon the Royal Navys powerful armada to protect its shores. It had also strengthened its land forces in the south of England the Home Office even released posters of German troops so the British people could easily identify enemy soldiers on their beaches, fields, and streets. Britain also had courageous men in the Royal Air Force, such as Keith Ogilvie, who by this time was a pilot officer ready to participate in the Battle of Britain.