Night Bombers in 1943

[Cacophonix]

An excellent documentary (made after the war) about the personnel that underpinned the bomber command effort. Historically accurate and shows the level of planning, science, mathematics, physics, meteorology, technical effort, analysis, photography, crypto-analysis, flying and overall exactitude, not to say professionalism that underpinned the British night bombing effort at all levels during the war. Well worth watching.



What is so striking is the youth of the flying crew. They all look like babies and it is so very sad to think that many of those gallant young men never came home!

Caco

[CharlieOneSix]

These two poems send shivers down my spine every time I read them. We owe those folk so much....

For all Bomber Command crews

Lie in the dark and listen. It's clear tonight so they're flying high,
Hundreds of them, thousands perhaps, riding the icy, moonlit sky.
Men, machinery, bombs and maps, altimeters and guns and charts,
Coffee, sandwiches, fleece-lined boots, bones and muscles and minds and hearts,
English saplings with English roots deep in the earth they've left below.
Lie in the dark and let them go; Lie in the dark and listen.

Lie in the dark and listen. They're going over in waves and waves
High above villages, hills and streams, country churches and little graves
And little citizen's worried dreams; very soon they'll have reached the sea.
Lie in the dark and let them go, theirs is a world we'll never know.
Lie in the dark and listen. And far below them will lie the bays
And cliffs and sands where they used to be taken for summer holidays.
Lie in the dark and let them go. Theirs is a world we'll never know.
Lie in the dark and listen.

Lie in the dark and listen. City magnates and steel contractors,
Factory workers and politicians, soft hysterical little actors,
Ballet dancers, reserved musicians, safe in your warm civilian beds.
Count your profits and count your sheep, life is passing above your heads,
Just turn over and try to sleep. Lie in the dark and let them go;
There's one debt you'll forever owe,

Lie in the dark and listen.


Spirits in Flight

I saw them return, seven spirits in flight,
Engines fired by the sparks of the night,
Lumbering, throbbing like a battered ghost,
So thankful for a friendly coast.

Glowing and gliding, a Lanc without sound,
The rubber screams as it kisses the ground,
Perfect touchdown on a deserted plain;
Now a cornfield, a field with no name.

Night after night, mission after mission;
Helmets, goggles, masks and ammunition,
The seven Sky Warriors from long past,
All knowing tonight could be their last.

I hear the field alive with noise,
Filled with brave men; some of them just boys,
I see them walk in their suits of leather,
Slowly and proudly they walk together.

Where their Lancs rose to meet the foe,
Now the larks rise, from their nests below,
Down the runway only peace is heard,
Save for the wind and the song of a bird.

Time passes, January to December,
From spring to winter the years drift on,
Every April, every Easter, I will remember
Cliff, Al, Pete and John -- Nick, Stan and Skipper Don.

By Eddy Coward dedicated to his brother Cliff and the crew of Lancaster LL899 of 49 Sqdn lost 12 April 1944.

[Alisoncc]

Thanks for posting C16. Most absorbing. When I took the Queens shilling in 1960, many of our officers and SNCO's had served during WWII. Our Battle of Britain church parades were always led by these, giving us a chance to recognise their bravery evidenced by the rows of decorations displayed. Respect for the grizzled old Flight Sergeant who ran the hangar store went up by a magnitude. Sh1t this guy was true hero.

Alison

[Cacophonix]

Thank you for posting those two wonderful poems C16.

I think it took a formidable kind of courage from the flying crew in Bomber command to go out night after night, facing the inexorable statistical calculus of numbers and fate that said "x number of you will not be coming home", every night, and yet having to do the same thing again and again with the metronomic precision of a well defined project schedule. I know that all the services faced their own particular hells but Bomber Command's steady drip, drip, drip must have been particularly hard to bear. These men are owed the highest honours and respect methinks!



Caco

[Pontius Navigator]

Cacophonix, thank you for that, technically that film was not post-war and historically accurate but a contemporary film shot during the war but only edited post -war. I cross posted to TOP and some very interesting and informed comment. Here is an example:

papajuliet , 6th Aug 2018 17:25
The film ( Night Bombers ) was made by Air Commodore Cozens, the base commander - not the station commander who, at the time ,was Group Captain Sheen.
The briefing part of the film was made on 9 March 1945 after cancellation of an operation ( n.b. not mission - that was an American term ) just before briefing. The A/C made use of the cancellation to make his film sequences.
The above information is taken from the book "Bomber Intelligence" by W E Jones who was the intelligence officer at the time ( he appears in the film at the briefing )
I think I'm right in saying that Cozens was the C.O of 19 sqdn. when it introduced the Spitfire into service prewar.