Boxall Harley - Devotion to a Calling: Far-East Flying and Survival with 62 Squadron RAF

First published in Great Britain in 2010 by
Pen & Sword Aviation
an imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street
Barnsley
South Yorkshire
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Copyright Group Captain C.H. Boxall & Joe Bamford

ISBN: 9781848841499
EPUB ISBN: 9781844685561
PRC ISBN: 9781844685578

The right of Group Captain C.H. Boxall & Joe Bamford to be identified as
authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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Contents

Acknowledgements

This book has only been made possible because of the help and cooperation of Group Captain Boxalls daughter, Sallie Hammond. She is also the goddaughter of Squadron Leader Arthur Scarf VC. and for many years the two men were close friends. Sallie has provided all the family photographs and her fathers personal documents, to fulfil her burning ambition to tell his fascinating story.

The project has its origins in a meeting between Sallie, Arthur Lane and myself in Stockport during 2004, after they had made contact via the Internet. Eighty-eight year old Arthur is a Manchester Regiment veteran who joined up in 1935 and was later posted to Singapore. During his time as a POW he regularly witnessed cruelty and torture being inflicted on those who were unable to defend themselves.

Arthur was particularly angered when he discovered that after the British Army surrender in February 1942, hundreds of women had been murdered. Many of them were nurses and members of the Queen Alexandras Nursing Service, as was Sallies mother Pat, who fortunately escaped the carnage that was Singapore. Arthur has always been interested in all aspects of the war in the Far East and he was keen that the account of events written by Sallies father should be published. As Arthur knew that my area of expertise is the Royal Air Force he contacted me and introduced me to Sallie.

I would also like to thank Stan Fielding, Tim Tilbrook and Norman Hurst. Stan was an aircraft fitter on 62 Squadron and he served with both Group Captain Boxall and Squadron Leader Scarf. Stan gave valuable information about the evacuation of Singapore, Sumatra and Java, supplying details of terrible events that had been lodged in his mind since 1942.

Tim Tillbrook provided both motivation and valuable technical support, without which the book would probably never have been completed. Norman Hurst has been a source of knowledge on numerous occasions and provided me with copies of records and references. It has been very rare that Norman has not been able to supply the answer to one of my queries and without his help this account would have been much shorter and less detailed.

Finally I would like to thank my long suffering partner Janice, who spent many lonely evenings while I searched through files or tapped away at the keyboard. After meeting Sallie Hammond, Janice realized the importance of the project and she has been very supportive and understanding throughout.

Introduction

Devotion to a Calling is a unique story about a young man who joined the Royal Air Force in 1936 and who was serving in Malaya at the time of the Japanese invasion. He went on to lead the first operational sorties flown by the RAF in the Far East, flying ageing Bristol Blenheims that stood little chance against Japanese fighters that were superior in both numbers and technology. Subsequently he was lucky to escape from Singapore, Sumatra and Java, from where he had to swim out to sea and climb aboard a ship.

This is also a very special story because the first part was actually written by Group Captain Charles Harley Boxall himself, as he lay in hospital in India suffering from tuberculosis. Fortunately he survived his illness and lived for many more years but, because of the pressures of work and other commitments, he never found the time to complete his memoirs.

Group Captain Boxalls account gives a detailed description of flying training in the mid 1930s and the important events in his life, such as when he joined 62 Squadron just after it was formed in 1937 and when the unit re-equipped with the Bristol Blenheim and underwent its epic move from Britain to Singapore in August 1939.

In 1940 he ditched into the sea and, with the other two members of his crew, spent six days on a remote deserted island. He describes how they survived without food or water before being rescued by local fishermen.

Group Captain Boxalls manuscript forms , to cover the devastating events in the Far East and the death of his close friend and colleague, Squadron Leader Arthur Scarf. From Malaya the story moves to India and recalls Group Captain Boxalls associations with the RAF airfields at Jodhpur and Mauripur, which he commanded between 1942 and 1944.

Finally there is mention of Group Captain Boxalls important role in 229 Group and his work with Transport Command, in building up its network of air routes and Staging Posts in India. He was a pioneer in the organization of trooping flights and he paved the way for the opening of air routes to the Far East, that were used by the RAF and civilian airlines such as BOAC and Qantas.

To give the book a more personal touch, Sallie decided that her father should be called Harley, rather being referred to in the text by his rank. That was the name everyone in the family called him and it was also the name by which he was best known to his friends and colleagues in the RAF

The hospital that Harley refers to at the beginning of his narrative in is the Baragwanath Military Hospital near Johannesburg in South Africa. It was a sanatorium specifically run for the treatment and welfare of servicemen suffering from tuberculosis.

PART ONE

Prologue

It is nearly two years since I came to this hospital in South Africa, invalided from India. Two weary, unnatural years made more irksome as there is no pain from the disease from which I am suffering. I have lain on this bed so long, read so many books, written so many letters that I am at a loss to find something to occupy my mind, to keep me from thinking of the glory of the past and the obscurity of the future. And so, for want of something better to do, I am going to set down the story of the happiest days of my life; not that there is anything great or extraordinary about them, considering the times, but they wantonly portray some of the devotion and love that men can give to their calling.

Harley Boxall

CHAPTER 1

Elementary Flying Training

Charles Harley Boxall was born on 17 January 1913 in Handsworth, a district of Birmingham that had been incorporated into that city in 1911. Details of his life during his formative years are not known but from the age of eleven he was a student at King Edward VI Grammar School in Aston. The school was founded in 1883 but it had been rebuilt and reorganized in 1911. It was then made up of three separate sites with the main one, and the biggest by far with 250 pupils, being at Aston.

Girls had been admitted to the school in that year but strict discipline was in force and a twelve-foot high wall separated them from the boys; fraternization was not allowed. Harley transferred to the High School in 1927 that was part of the same establishment and his principal interests were noted as being swimming, tennis, rugby and horse riding. He became proficient in speaking French and German. He passed his matriculation examination in July 1929 and he left full-time education and went to work for the Accident and Guarantee Corporation as a clerk.