Simon Gooch - Group Captain John Joe Collier DSO, DFC and Bar

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

Copyright Simon Gooch 2015

ISBN: 978 1 47385 131 3
EPUB ISBN: 978 1 47385 099 6
PRC ISBN: 978 1 47385 115 3

The right of Simon Gooch to be identified as Author of this Work has been
asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
1988. Simon Gooch is acknowledged as the sole author of, and the sole owner
of, the worldwide copyrights in the Work (the limited copyright), excluding
the dramatic, film, sound broadcasting, television broadcasting, Xerography,
gramophone and strip cartoon rights (the retained copyright), all of which
are to be retained by Mr J.M.B. Collier. In the event of the Authors death,
the limited copyright will revert to Mr J.M.B. Collier or to his Collier heirs.

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 by
Mac Style Ltd, Bridlington, East Yorkshire

Printed and bound in England
By CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

Pen & Sword Books Ltd incorporates the imprints of Pen & Sword
Aviation, Pen & Sword Family History, Pen & Sword Maritime, Pen &
Sword Military, Pen & Sword Discovery, Pen and Sword Fiction, Pen
and Sword History, Wharncliffe Local History, Wharncliffe True Crime,
Wharncliffe Transport, Pen & Sword Select, Pen & Sword Military
Classics, Leo Cooper, The Praetorian Press, Seaforth Publishing and
Frontline Publishing.

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

J ohn Collier, always known in the Royal Air Force as Joe, led a very unusual and in some ways charmed life during the Second World War. Having joined up early, in 1936, he was actively engaged in hostilities from the first day, flying his Hampden bomber on a sweep of the North Sea looking for the Admiral Scheer. He went on to be one of the most decorated pilots of the early years of the war.

A wing commander at the age of 25 and having done much to smooth the introduction of the revolutionary new bomber, the Lancaster, into service with 97 Squadron, Collier was selected to perform a new role at the Air Ministry in the Directorate of Bomber Operations (B Ops 1). From early 1943 he was helping to plan the Combined Bomber Offensive, in cooperation with the rapidly-growing USAAF bomber force, devising the precision attacks of the next two years that did so much to help win the war. Perhaps surprisingly, despite the dramas of his sixty-three missions flown, John Colliers time spent in stuffy Whitehall offices countering the V-weapon threat and planning the Dambusters Raid and much else provided what he described as the real adventure of his war.

While serving in the Far East just after the war ended, he wrote a typescript memoir of the Whitehall years and began with an Apology:

His own Introduction stressed the greater significance he felt his work in Whitehall possessed:

During the War little was heard of the great Military Organisations which conducted and controlled the vast machinery of the War. The Air Ministry was one such of these. It is difficult to imagine that adventure can be found in a Ministry, surely the excitement and glory of War is on the Battlefield? For myself, I suppose it could be said that I had had my fair share of adventure during the four years I was on operations in Bomber Command. I refrain from writing about these adventures because they were in no way different from those experienced by so many airmen of that gallant Command, and further so many books have been written by real heroes, and my personal friends, such as Guy Gibson VC and Leonard Cheshire VC, both of whom are household names today. I found my adventure in this war in the Air Ministry. Not that I took more than a small part in the adventures, which may be a slight misnomer, but I was in a privileged position to watch the most interesting period of the war in Europe during the two most vital years. I had my senses of great thrill and disappointment, and occasionally of achievement, even though such achievements were initially on paper. You may agree with me that adventure can be found during War other than on the Battlefield itself. I hope so!

John Colliers modesty about his feats of airmanship and leadership in the front-line bomber squadrons, which saw him receive a DFC and Bar, a DSO, and to be Mentioned in Despatches three times, is admirable. However, perhaps the story now needs to be rebalanced somewhat, to give a full portrait of both John Collier the wartime pilot and the planner, as well as the young pre-war cadet and the post-war career RAF man who spent twenty-two years in total in the service.

This biography of John Collier is based on his log books, his record of service and squadron record books and combat reports. There are letters home to his parents, and some press reports. As well as including a large part of his own 1946 memoir of the Whitehall years and some of his first draft with my own annotations, editorial comment and researches there are also his shorter accounts (written much later) of active service in Britain and the Far East. Joe Collier also features substantially in other wartime memoirs, notably his friend Guy Gibsons classic Enemy Coast Ahead.

Almost seventy years after the end of the war the sacrifice of the men of Bomber Command has finally been recognized at the heart of the capital with a grand monument at Hyde Park Corner, unveiled in the summer of 2012. Controversies remain over the prosecution of the air war, and in particular the role of Sir Arthur Harris, but the unimaginable bravery and dedication of RAF air crew cannot be denied, and likewise the intellectual achievement of its planners. I hope in particular that this expansion of John Colliers unique life story will add even more to the lustre of his and his remarkably youthful comrades record of intense involvement in the epic struggle of 1939 to 1945.

S pecial thanks to Mark Collier for the inspiration for this biography of his father, based on John Colliers unpublished memoir and its first draft, and for access to the family archive of documents, letters and photographs; all of the illustrations included in this book come from the Collier family collection.

Many thanks to the wider Collier family for help and encouragement, especially John Colliers ex-RAF niece Maureen Hodgson.

I gratefully acknowledge Dr Carol Downers permission to quote from the papers of her late father Air Vice Marshal Sydney Bufton CB, DFC, held by the Churchill Archives at Churchill College, Cambridge [correspondence with John Collier in BUFT/5/13; transcript of taped interview in BUFT/5/19]. Thanks also to the director and staff of the Churchill Archives Centre for their assistance.