WW2 Network

For all of his long life, Ronald Huie was fascinated by aircraft. He joined the RAF as a boy entrant, served in far-flung parts during the World War Two and, when a medical problem grounded him, worked in air force administration for many years.

When he retired he held the rank of wing commander and, even then, his close links with the service continued and he was appointed the Regular Forces’ Employment Officer, in Carlisle.

His post here entailed finding civilian jobs for men and women who had left the army, navy and air force and he used his powers of persuasion with prospective employers to considerable effect.

He did the job in an old-fashioned and old school way which made him very well liked.

At home in Brampton, his abiding passion for all things aeronautical had him very frequently tuning his radio set in to the Carlisle Airport controllers’ frequency, so that he could keep abreast of all that was going on there.

Born and brought-up in Gateshead, he joined the RAF as a boy of 16 and became an apprentice fitter at Halton, near Aylesbury. As a technical apprentice he was one of the group always known as ‘brats’.

He went on to the RAF College at Cranwell, servicing Armstrong Whitworth ‘Whitley’ bombers before moving on again, to train as a observer in Britain and in Canada, where he spent some time in Quebec.

Eventually, observers became navigators and he flew with Coastal Command on maritime patrols during the wartime period known as the Battle of the Atlantic and then he moved on to locations much further afield.

As a navigator on the big Consolidated ‘Liberator’ bombers he served in the Gambia and then in India and Ceylon and the far eastern theatre generally, for which he was awarded the Burma Star.

When the war ended he held the rank of pilot officer but then his medical condition meant a recall to the UK where he joined the RAF’s administrative branch, training in accountancy, personnel work and management and working in various parts of Britain.

He was appointed adjutant at the RAF 15 Maintenance Unit, in Lichfield, then became a statistics officer and was promoted to flight lieutenant. Then followed some time in accountancy.

In 1956 he was posted to Aden, where he became a member of the command accounts staff, was promoted squadron leader and visited various Gulf states and Cyprus.

He later served in Germany, became a wing commander in 1966 and was stationed at Biggin Hill before, in 1974, joining the RAF Trade Standards staff.

He left the air force in 1978, aged 55 and then became the employment officer in Carlisle, retiring 10 years later to do voluntary work with the Forces’ Help Society, the Lord Roberts‘ Workshops and the Soldiers’, Sailors’ and Airmen’s Families Association.

He was a member of the mess at the RAF 14 Maintenance Unit in Carlisle, where he supported most of the various functions, in particular the Saturday Club. He played golf and he played snooker.

He had married, in Middlesbrough, in 1947 and although his wife’s given name was Alice, she was always known as Lyn. She died in 2005.

Their first home in Cumbria had been at Spadeadam Farm and they moved to Brampton about 20 years ago.

Wing Commander Huie was 84 when he died and he leaves his daughter. A son, also called Ronald, died in 1971.

His funeral took place at Carlisle Crematorium, with Co-operative Funeralcare, Brampton, making the arrangements and his ashes will be buried in his wife’s grave at Brampton Cemetery in August.

THE crew of a Washington bomber which plunged out of the skies and crashed in North Wales, killing the 10 men on board, are to be commemorated 55 years on.

The cause of the crash near the village of Llanarmon-yn-Ial was never established, and it turned out to be one of the largest death tolls the RAF had seen during peacetime.

Now a service is to be held at the local church and a slate memorial erected to those who died.

Organisers are appealing for help to trace relatives of the 10 who may want to attend the service.

On September 6 Northop Silver Band, Llwynegrin Singers and RAFA representatives will join families of those who perished at a service at Llanarmon-yn-Ial Church.

A slate memorial will be unveiled listing the names of those who died, and there will be a parade with standard bearers and a contingent from RAF Marham, where the Washington first flew from.

Family are coming from throughout the UK, and also from California, but organisers say they are anxious to contact any others.

Among those attending are Sheelah Adamson and Richard Sloane from London, daughter and son of Squadron Leader Bill Sloane, pilot and captain of the aircraft.

Alex Hughson and his wife Lyn from California, and their daughter, Tamar Hughson from Edinburgh, will also be there.

Alex is the brother of Sergeant Bobby Hughson, one of the gunners on the aircraft.

It was on the night of January 8, 1953, that the plane circled over Ruthin, and witnesses said it was clearly in trouble.

During its last minutes it lost its tail section and fell into woods below, but not one of the crew sent an emergency radio message and no-one baled out.

Organiser Ross Duffield, a retired detective chief superintendent with North Wales Police, says the crash is a real mystery.

He and former colleague Police Sergeant Darryl Jones have traced some relatives of those who perished, but are also anxious to find others who may wish to attend the service.

Ross was at one stage part of the regional crime squad at Hawarden and he had spotted six RAF graves with the same date of death in the local cemetery.

After he retired, he started to investigate what had happened and it was a journey which, he says, took on a life of its own.

He spent a lot of time researching and delving through the official Board of Inquiry report into the accident at the National Archives in London.

The flight should have been a routine trip for the members of 90 Squadron from RAF Marham, Norfolk.

The regular captain was not available and his place was taken by Squadron leader Williams Rutherford Sloane, 32.

The plane was a B29 Washington Bomber, WF502, of 90 Squadron Bomber Command and that day the crew of 10 – average age 24 – went on a bombing exercise.

The plane flew out over the North Sea and then back across the north of England.

At 8.57pm they were 19,000 feet above Wirral, probably near Neston, but what happened next will never be known.

The last radar contact was over Wirral at about 13,000 ft.

“It went into a steep dive and no-one knew why,” Ross said.

The plane’s tail section broke away and it landed upside down in woods at Wern Goed, between Gelli Gynnan Farm and Chweleiriog Lwyd, Llanarmon-yn-Ial.

A Board Of Inquiry failed to uncover the reason for the crash.

“Clearly something went dramatically wrong with the engine.

“The rear tail section fell off and it plunged out of the sky,” Ross said.

One witness reported the engine appeared to rev up then died.

Local people immediately went to the scene and three even went inside the aircraft, which was on fire.

Two crew were carried out but no-one survived. Then the plane exploded.

The inquest heard that all had died of multiple fractures before the fire took hold.

Garmon Jones, who lives at Gelli Gynan Farm, is the grandson of the first man at the scene at the time, and has given Ross Duffield access to the crash site and helped him piece together what happened.

AT 20.26hrs on August 27, 1942, a Vickers Wellington Mk III hurtled down the runway at RAF Warboys in Cambridgeshire, pointed its blunt nose into the night sky and headed off to attack the Fiesler aircraft factory in Kassel, Germany.

On board, young Fred Shepherd from St John’s, Worcester, settled into the tail gunner’s seat and checked again his two 7.7mm machine guns. It was a routine he had carried out many times before, because although only 22 years old, Fred was one of the RAF’s top guns.

A sergeant, highly skilled and experienced despite his comparative youth, he had taken part in three of the Allies’ “thousand bomber raids” on Cologne, Essen and Bremen earlier in the year and survived a fire on board his aircraft returning from Warnemaunde.

This was to be his 13th mission with the recently formed 156 Squadron of Bomber Command, but he was unlikely to have been superstitious.

However, the night of August 27 did not promise well for bombers.

Clear and moonlit, conditions were ideal for the German defenders, particularly the Messerschmitts of Nachtjadgeschwader 1, the home side’s crack nightfighter unit and no British airman was under any illusions about what was coming.

As a member of the elite Pathfinder Force (motto: We light the way), Fred’s Wellington was one of 30 going ahead to mark the target for the main bomb carriers, a job that put them seriously in harm’s way as they met the full force of the enemy welcome.

The Pathfinders gained height over the Southwold sector of East Anglia and flew across the southern North Sea to Edam in Holland, where they turned south east, passing south of Munster, before approaching Kassel. Where all Hell let loose.

Given free rein by the clear weather, the Messerschmitts swooped and a BF110 nightfighter piloted by German ace Hauptmann Wolfgang Thimming locked on to the Wellington carrying Fred and his five fellow crewmen.

A burst of fire raked the Pathfinder and sent it spinning from the sky. It crashed on to the Laurenz textile factory at Epe, four miles south of Gronau, killing everyone on board. The time was 23.25 on August 27, 1942.

Fast forward 46 years to 1988 and Paul Smith is serving with the RAF in Germany. The son of Fred Shepherd’s great Worcester boyhood pal Arthur Smith, Paul decided to spend a leave visiting the Arnhem battlefields in Holland.

“While travelling near Kleve, Worcester’s twin town, I happened to spot a sign for the Reichwald Forest War Cemetery,” he said. “My father had often talked about Fred, so I decided to see if he was buried there.

“I knew that he had originally been buried at the Evangelical Friedhof at Rheine, but later all British Forces graves were relocated in Commonwealth War Cemeteries.

“After about half-an-hour looking around the Reichwald Forest cemetery, I found Fred’s grave. I took a photograph of it and signed the visitors’ book. When I returned to Worcester, I visited Fred’s sister, who then still lived in St John’s. I entered the house thinking she might want to forget about what had happened to her brother, as it was all a long time ago.

“But to my surprise there was a huge photograph of Fred hanging over the fireside. I gave her a copy of the photograph of the grave and she was really overwhelmed that somebody had actually gone to visit Fred.

“I told her all I knew about what happened to him and over the next few years I carried on visiting her.

Sadly she died five years ago.”

And that might have been the end of the story, Except it isn’t. Paul Smith, who lives in Thames Close, Worcester, and has served for 24 years in the RAF, both as a regular and reservist, is determined that Fred Shepherd is one son of Worcester who will never be forgotten.

He has researched as much as he can about Fred’s life and death and every Remembrance Sunday places a cross with Fred’s name on at the war memorial outside Worcester Cathedral. Last year he placed a framed photograph. It suffered weather damage over the winter and so on August 27, the 66th anniversary of Fred’s death, Paul is renewing it. He says: “Fred was only one of more than 55,000 brave men killed with RAF Bomber Command during the Second World War, but by keeping his memory alive I hope people never forget the sacrifice they all made.”

● There’s a postscript to that summer night in 1942. Hauptmann Wolfgang Thimming, the Nachtjadgeschwader commander who shot down Fred Shepherd’s Wellington, went on to become a highly decorated nightfighter ace with 24 allied aircraft to his name.

He was twice awarded the Iron Cross and received other wartime honours. After the war he served as a West German diplomat in Sweden, where he died in 1976 having received the Svardsorden, a Swedish order of honour, a rare occurrence for a foreigner.

An RAF report on the Fiesler raid reported that 306 aircraft set off, of which 222 attacked the target, which was “severely damaged”.

The Germans claimed to have shot down 35 aircraft, while Bomber Command admitted to 30 losses with another 40-plus aircraft damaged by enemy aircraft or flak.

Conditions over the target were described as “pretty rough”.

ROGUE divers are raiding heritage-listed wrecks in Darwin Harbour, regular visitors to the sites said yesterday.

Local divers said artefacts had been stolen from the RAAF C-47 plane wreck in Fannie Bay.

Regular diver Peter Darlington dived the wreck recently and said items including a radio, flight gauges and a fire extinguisher had been taken.

An engine and a propeller had also been dislodged.

"Many of the artefacts have been removed and there are signs of extensive damage to the airframe itself,” he said.

There are fears that other wrecks in the harbour may have been looted.

Some of the damage to the C-47 appeared to have been done by a large anchor, though anchoring at the site is not allowed. The raids are recent, probably within the past two months.

An NT government monitoring dive revealed more than 10 artefacts had been stolen and the plane’s tail penetrated. It is understood heritage officers are hunting for the offenders.

People who damage heritage sites can be hit with hefty penalties under the Heritage Conservation Act.

Site wreckers can be liable for fines up to $10,000 or 12 months in jail — plus forfeiting the boat or vehicle used to get there.

Several harbour wrecks are popular with divers and with fishermen as fish take shelter around the wreckage.

Dive operators use a buoy near the C-47 wreck for mooring, so it is believed the damage was caused by amateurs or fishermen.

"Such destruction has to stop,” Mr Darlington said.

"Please, to all the fishos out there — do not drop anchors on to these sites.”

There were also signs of damage to another recently-discovered harbour wreck.

Anyways, then WWII started and Australian troops discovered Vegemite was highly flammable and if treated correctly and stuffed into empty artillery shell casings, it could be hurled at the enemy, much like a grenade.

The story of a Norwegian sea dog who became an unlikely war hero has been put into print.

It is claimed that Bamse - a 14 stone St Bernard - saved the lives of two sailors during World War II.

He also performed many other good deeds while the mascot on the Norwegian Navy minesweeper the Thorrod, which was stationed in Montrose and Dundee.

A book has now been written, aiming to separate the fact from the fiction surrounding the canine hero.

Among his exploits included going into the water to rescue a sailor who had fallen overboard and knocking over a knifeman who was trying to attack a young lieutenant.

Bamse died in 1944 and is buried in Montrose with his head facing towards Norway.

Since then, a statue has been erected in the Angus town in honour of the dog and he was awarded the gold medal for gallantry and devotion from the PDSA charity.

Angus Whitson, co-author of Sea Dog Bamse, said: "My favourite story is him taking the sailors out of the pub and making sure they got back to their ship on time.

"From what I have read he physically pushed the sailors out of the pubs, there are stories of him nudging them along the road and anyone who tried to escape was herded into the crew again until they got back to the Thorrod.

"It’s better than a Lassie film. In many ways it’s an extraordinary story - the average dog in my experience has a loyalty for his master and the family he lives with, but Bamse was a dog that appeared to have a loyalty for a wider family.

"He had a sphere of concern for those people that he loved and he looked after them very well."

Fellow author, Andrew Orr, said: "I was in a fortunate position, being a GP in this town, that many of my patients remembered the dog and were very keen to talk to me about it.

"I started scribbling their stories furiously, but then research took me to Norway, to Canada, South Africa, and other people who had something to say and I was compelled to write this down and it became apparent that there was a story just bursting to be told and a book had to be written."

The story of a Norwegian sea dog who became an unlikely war hero has been put into print.

It is claimed that Bamse - a 14 stone St Bernard - saved the lives of two sailors during World War II.

He also performed many other good deeds while the mascot on the Norwegian Navy minesweeper the Thorrod, which was stationed in Montrose and Dundee.

A book has now been written, aiming to separate the fact from the fiction surrounding the canine hero.

Among his exploits included going into the water to rescue a sailor who had fallen overboard and knocking over a knifeman who was trying to attack a young lieutenant.

Bamse died in 1944 and is buried in Montrose with his head facing towards Norway.

Since then, a statue has been erected in the Angus town in honour of the dog and he was awarded the gold medal for gallantry and devotion from the PDSA charity.

Angus Whitson, co-author of Sea Dog Bamse, said: "My favourite story is him taking the sailors out of the pub and making sure they got back to their ship on time.

"From what I have read he physically pushed the sailors out of the pubs, there are stories of him nudging them along the road and anyone who tried to escape was herded into the crew again until they got back to the Thorrod.

"It’s better than a Lassie film. In many ways it’s an extraordinary story - the average dog in my experience has a loyalty for his master and the family he lives with, but Bamse was a dog that appeared to have a loyalty for a wider family.

"He had a sphere of concern for those people that he loved and he looked after them very well."

Fellow author, Andrew Orr, said: "I was in a fortunate position, being a GP in this town, that many of my patients remembered the dog and were very keen to talk to me about it.

"I started scribbling their stories furiously, but then research took me to Norway, to Canada, South Africa, and other people who had something to say and I was compelled to write this down and it became apparent that there was a story just bursting to be told and a book had to be written."