Great news, It’s amazing how much info is available if only we ASK. Good for you. Keeo it up, and keep us posted as to what you find. Thanks for this

Great idea, Alohha. I have one uncle, aged 87, at last count, a veteran of the R.E.M.E. from 1943 onward, and am slowly extracting from him everything he has to tell. Interestingly, I found out from him a while ago that his own dad, my mother’s father, was kicked out of the British Army in 1907, because he had gone stone deaf. Get that info out of your still-living relatives, and share it with the guys here!! In 1996, herself and I were visiting with my mother, who had moved to Australia with my dad in 1964, showed us an official document from the South African Constabulary advising my other grandfather that he was being discharged from the SAC in order for him to be able to join the British Army for the Second Boer War, which he did survive. Document was not in my mother’s papers after she died in 2005.

A few years ago In Kettering, my older brother was approached by a man he had known in school some fifty-five years earlier.

They exchanged pleasantries and the man explained that his father had recently died, and that he and his brother were clearing out their father’s house in prep for putting it on the housing market. My brother remarked to him that our fathers had been friends during WWII and that he might think about doing something around the house before selling it.

The man listened with a puzzled look, as my brother recommended that he take a look up in the attic for something hard, wrapped in an oily rag. “Let me know what you find,” he said.

A while later the two met up again, and the man said, Yes, he had found an oily rag on one of the attic beams in the house, opened it and found a .45 Colt M1911A1 automatic pistol. My brother laughed and said, “Your dad got that gun from our dad. He used to buy them from the Yanks at the Air Force bases and sell them to all his friends. You’re the second person I’ve run across that had one of Dad’s guns!” No mention, BTW, of what happened to the ‘piece.’

I can see the headlines already, “His Dad was a W.W.II Gunrunner.” At least it won’t be in the ‘News of the World.’

Great collection of antiquities you have there, T.O. Thanks, too, fo the link.

Never worry about ‘cutting a long story short’ here.

You have a ready and eager audience for any reminiscence of those days.

We are, of course, well versed in the lore of the Home Guard (Not all of it from the still entertaining ‘Dad’s Army’ TV series.) and also of the story of evacuees.

Actually, I say that, but then I’m from a generation close to the end of WW2 and we were often told of the kids who were evacuated, and indeed threatened with the same if we misbehaved – this despite the war being several years in the past.

I’m guessing there isn’t a reader here who wouldn’t have loved to swop places with you for one day on that honey wagon.

Moggy

Moggy, thanks for your comment. I know my little raving was somewhat lengthy. Reason is that it’s taken from my blog, where people from all over the world come in to read stuff and have no idea about things pertaining to the war. I guess the same goes for this forum. We have no idea who those “guests” might be or where from. My old boss at British Aiways always told me the letters I wrote for him were a way too wordy. Little did the old guy know that one day that would come in handy. My wife (in future I shall always refer to her as “herself,”) is a native Londoner, indeed a Cockney, and she was an evacuee (taken at a young age to Yorkshire, where, unfortunately, she wasn’t treated too well. Happily, her older brother was sent to the same place which did give her some comfort. Thank you, too, for the positive comments.

Well, guys, I threatened you with this experience, and I’d better keep my promise, or you won’t believe me when I tell you my stories:

Please bear with me, while I explain to those who have no idea about evacuees, exactly what happened during WWII, the big one.

For health reasons, my dad was not allowed into the army, or other branch of the active armed forces, and was assigned instead to the Home Guard, a paramilitary force made up of those unfit for regular army service and those too old for more active service. So, since the home guard was only a part-time endeavor, he had a regular job. It wasn’t the most prestigious job in the world, but he was paid a small fortune each week. His paycheck normally totaled about six or seven times what other kids’ dads were making. It wasn’t danger pay, but perhaps was ‘unpleasant work pay.’ He drove what we might politely call a ‘honey truck.’

This turned out to be a really special responsibility, since his employer, and Dad’s best friend, Ted, had an exclusive contract to supply “honey truck” services to a string of American air force bases in the Kettering area. Living in the East Midlands, our home area provided host services to a number of USAAF bases, from which, starting in August, 1942, the Americans began to bomb Hitler’s “Fortress Europe.” Names like Grafton Underwood, Harrington, and Polebrook were places that he visited daily, to empty and hose out the airfields’ “facilities.”

Before I tell you how we kids enter the story, I need to tell you about the ‘evacuees.’ During the early months of World War II, the British government felt that the danger from the aerial bombing of large British cities was too great and ordered parents to send their children out of the the city to smaller communities in the countryside where the risk from bombing was minimal.

The whole experience of the kids who were evacuated out of the big cities, is quite intriguing and well worth the read. If the subject is of interest to you, may I suggest a fascinating read by the late Ben Wicks, the Toronto Star cartoonist, who authored the book, “No Time to Wave Goodbye.” This is the stories of hundreds of evacuees as researched by Ben Wicks. The stories come from all corners of the earth, to which those evacuees had scattered themselves.

(Twenty-five or thirty years ago, my wife and I were attending a wedding at the airport hotel at Dorval Airport in Montreal, [now, Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport,] when my sharp-eyed wife spotted Ben Wicks who was attending a function at that same venue. We had seen him being interviewed at length on TV on more than one occasion. Although we were heading upstairs, she caught sight of Mr. Wicks, and mentioned him to me. We walked back downstairs and introduced ourselves, especially my wife, because she comes from the same part of London as he, and both had been evacuees. He asked us whether or not we had read his book and briefly explained the sources of all the stories in it. Well, they were both near to tears. He told us that the foreword in the book had been written by another former evacuee, the ubiquitous, and iconic British actor, Michael Caine. She faithfully promised to buy the book and read it, which we did, and had to agree that it was riveting information. A real ‘page-turner.’ It was difficult to put it down, even though my wife had gone through that same experience herself. Despite loaning it to several friends over the intervening years, she still has the original book.)

This caused hundreds of school-aged kids to be shipped into the Kettering area, to be housed, fed and cared for by local families. Our town certainly fit the category of “smaller communities.” A very dear neighbourly, and childless, couple, who lived just around the corner from our home, the Baileys, took in a London boy close to our ages, 5, 6, or 7, by the name of Charlie Mayes, with whom we became extremely close friends.

My maternal grandparents took in another young Londoner, a lad, also around our age, whom we always called Ronnie Rubberguts. I did hear from my uncle that one of his sisters, an aunt of mine, had called him that because he would eat anything in sight. Personally, I cannot recall why the nickname, nor do I know whatever became of these two guys, who, by now, would both be in their mid- to late-seventies, if they are still living. What a shame we lost touch with them.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, all these kids had to go to school somewhere, so they took over half of our school schedule. At first, we would go in the morning and they would go in the afternoon; later, we would have Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, while they would attend school on Tuesday, and Thursday, then we would switch over so that they could have the three-day schedule for the next week. The bottom line is that we had an extraordinary amount of free time without having to go to school.

With parents unable to trust us at home alone at our tender ages, other arrangements had to be made, so we would have to accompany Dad on the ‘honey truck.” Get the picture? Two little kids 7, and 8 years of age, respectively, going with their dad to visit USAAF bases, loaded to the gills with B-17 Flying Fortresses at Grafton Underwood and Polebrook; B-24 Liberators at Harrington. What an awesome experience. [If you look carefully at Google Earth satellite photographs of eastern England you can find these airfields, close to the village of the same name, despite their having been broken up and plowed over decades ago. There is something about the configuration of an airfield that’s hard to hide.]

Here comes the main part of the story. On one occasion, we were at Grafton Underwood, with Dad doing the rounds of “the facilities.” You must appreciate that, when the airfields were built for the British military establishment, prior to the American entry into World War II, they were prepared using the most economic means possible. This resulted in only runways and taxiways being constructed; no roads for vehicles to get around on; if you wanted to drive across the airfield, you had no choice but to drive on the taxiways. So Dad’s way of getting around was to make use of the taxiways.

Are you ready? While driving to get from one facility to another, the ‘honey truck’ broke down. Right in the middle of the taxiway! My brother and I were standing outside the pickup truck watching dad with a wrench and a screwdriver, trying to get the motor to restart, when, one after another, eighteen Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses came taxying up behind the stalled vehicle. They were forced to stop, since we were completely blocking the way. They held, with engines idling, with the lead ship at about fifty yards behind the truck and just sat there for what seemed like an age, waiting for the truck to be moved.

Well, that just wasn’t about to happen. Ultimately, after about ten minutes, I guess, the belly hatch of the lead aircraft swung open and four members of the crew dropped out and came running over to talk to Dad. They said, “Charles, we can’t stand here any longer, we’re using all of our fuel; we’re going to have to push you out of the way.” Dad agreed and jumped in behind the wheel, so that he could steer, while the four young aircrew pushed the “honey truck” onto the grass beside the hard surface of the taxiway. What amazed me, was that they all knew Dad’s name!

After that, the three of us stood while this entire group of bombers slowly thundered past us, up to the end of the runway and took off, a sight that I will never forget.

Unfortunately, that’s not the end of the story. Many years later, in 1996, in fact, we learned from our mother that Dad did hear again about this incident, from the guys working in air traffic control. They reported that not all of the aircraft from the group had returned that night, due to running out of fuel, more than likely caused by their ‘holding’ behind the “honey truck.” Although it wasn’t our dad’s fault that the truck had broken down, they were a bit upset with him, because they unnecessarily lost aircraft, which were vitally needed at that time in the campaign against Germany.

Like you, during WW II, I lived in the shadow of the 8th AF. In my case it was the 306th BG at Thurleigh and they were more often early starters than late flyers. Very occasionally they would send individual B-17 aircraft on leaflet dropping missions at night. As I recollect Double British Summer Time was in effect in order to move all operations, flying and farming, into the daylight hours.
Unfortunately without a more accurate date it will be difficult to find more info in the records of the incident that you remember.
Have you tried contacting the 384BG Association and ask some questions there? Perhaps they have copies of the individual squadrons Combat Diaries available.

I tried to get hold of the 384BG, Deryck, and told the tale exactly as I have related it to you folks, but got no reply. I remember the great time we had during the DBST, and how light it stayed at night. Some place in the U.S. was supposed to experiment with that in the next year or so. The plane in our experience exploded so violently, that there was absolutely no way it could have been laden with leaflets, something that did happen quite a lot toward the end of the ‘great unpleasantness.’

Thanks very much for this, David. Eight or nine years ago, my brother, John, drove my wife and me to this monument . His comment at the time was that this was on the exact spot where the B-17 crashed that we had both witnessed when we were kids during WWII. I took a 35mm film pic of the monument and it was spoiled for some reason. Anyway, I really appreciate your kindness in taking this one. Too, for letting me loose on all those pics in your flickr files. I’ll drool at leisure over those. Thanks again. Eug.