By Richard Townshend Bickers
James H. “Ginger” Lacey was a sergeant pilot during the Battle of Britain and one of the RAF’s top scorers. He shot down a total of twenty-eight Axis aircraft and finished the war as a squadron leader in Burma, but in September 1940 he became famous as the man who shot down a Heinkel that had just bombed Buckingham Palace. Insult to the king and all that, don’t you know. Here is how he did it.
Familiarity with combat, and confirmation of a man’s prowess in it, did not lessen the strain of aerial warfare. Indeed, for some, the longer they survived the greater seemed the probability that their turn to be killed could not possibly be much more deferred. Whatever the reason, there were many by now who reacted agonizingly to every announcement from the Tannoy, and Lacey
Was one of them. Every time the loudspeaker hummed its preliminary note on being switched on, he had to rush from his bed in the dispersal hut, or from the grass under his Hurricane’s wing, where he was lying, and vomit. Whether the message turned out to be “AC Plonk to report to the orderly room immediately,” “The film in the station cinema tonight is. . . ,” or the anticipated “501 Squadron — scramble!” the effect was the same. His stomach muscles jerked convulsively, his fatigue-sodden body and mind could not control them, and he must be sick.
Flying six and eight times a day, never less than four times, week in and week out, had brought all the pilots to such a state of tiredness that they could not bother even to walk away from their aircraft on landing. In that blisteringly hot summer it was easiest just to lie on the grass in the shade of a Hurricane’s or Spitfire’s wing and fall instantly asleep. If the intelligence officer came to ask you for a combat report, you put one in, and with it your claims for aircraft destroyed or damaged. If nobody asked you, you did not trouble to volunteer the information; until, perhaps, the day was finished and memory dulled. In this way, many of the pilots were never credited with victories they had won. Time and again there was another
Scramble before an lO could make out combat reports on the mission just completed, and by the time the boys were back from that one, everyone had forgotten about the previous sortie. . . and so on, with scrambles piling up and each obliterating the details of its predecessor. Time after time, a pilot who had scored successes on an early sortie must have been killed on a later one before ever being able to make a report, which would, at least, have given him permanent credit for what he had done.
Not that the Battle of Britain pilots needed any sordid accretion of numbers after their names to proclaim their skill, bravery, and stamina. Just by being airborne, reacting to each German raid, they were saving the world: their presence was enough, on many occasions, to turn the enemy away before combat was joined. And the strain of operational flying was no less when no enemy was encountered, than when a vicious dogfight was being decided: for each time they flew they expected to see the German and attack him, and it was this as much as, perhaps more than, the moments of battle that frayed their nerves and robbed them of refreshing sleep and proper relaxation.
Some of them became so emotionally numb that they were like automata: morose,
Withdrawn, wanting neither food nor companionship, dragging themselves through each day in almost a stupor. Others, more highly strung, teetered constantly on the brink of frenzy: talking incessantly, smoking heavily, forcing themselves to loud laughter and feigned high spirits. But among the unfriendly silence on the one hand and the horseplay on the other were the majority: levelheaded, thoroughly professional, in control of themselves. Perhaps Lacey’s laconic Yorkshire character was as much responsible for keeping him sane and alive through that period as his naturally brilliant eyesight and swift mental and physical reaction to quickly changing events. If it hadn’t been for that damned, whining Tannoy, he would probably never have shown any outward signs of nervous wear. Each day made the situation more desperate, with an average loss of fifteen fighter aircraft and ten pilots, nearly all in 11 Group.
On the thirtieth of August, over the North Foreland, he fought an engagement with thirty or forty Me-110 Jaguars which did not stay to dispute the issue: he put two long bursts into one of them, saw it stagger into the low haze with smoke emerging from one engine, and reckoned that he had a “probable” at least. There was a twenty-minute
Break at base while the aircraft were refueled and rearmed; but the German Air Force was under orders to batter its way through the British defenses and prepare the ground for Hitler’s final, devastating assault: 501 was soon in the air again, this time with the controller ordering, “Vector two seven zero. A hundred-plus bandits approaching Dungeness.” And how right he was, for there were the He-llls and Me-110s in a countless swarm.
Lacey, Yellow Two, picked the 110 which was leading a big formation and attacked from ahead, opening fire at 400 yards and continuing until, as his combat report describes his actions, “collision was imminent. So I broke underneath, and when I pulled up, I saw that the Me-110 had left the formation and was going east with smoke coming from its port engine. Climbing, I found a He-111 just ahead, also going east, rather slowly, as though it had been damaged. I attacked, opened fire at 250 yards, and saw the undercarriage drop and the port engine catch fire. As I closed, long flames and thick black smoke made vision difficult. I had to break off, as I was attacked by several 110s. I continued fighting until I had no ammunition left.”
But there was more in store before the
Thirtieth of August came to a close. Lacey recalls that “later on that day I had an interesting experience.” It seems that a newsreel film unit was working on Gravesend aerodrome and wanted a picture of a squadron scramble. Agreeably, the CO allowed his pilots to get into their cockpits while the cameras whirred, preparatory to demonstrating a quick, dummy takeoff.
But even in those circumstances they had their R/T sets switched on, and with the cameras barely in position, the sector controller’s voice dinned in the pilots’ ears, “Scramble. Bandits in Thames estuary.”
The delighted cameramen marveled at the cooperation they were receiving: the Hurricanes thundered across the airfield, climbed steeply, formed up, and headed eastward.
Over the estuary, 501 saw well over fifty He-llls, with several Do-17s and a big escort of Me-109s, flying due west. The CO led them into a head-on attack and they held their squadron formation, four vies of three, in the manner of head-ons of that day. “On the go’s word we all put our fingers on the trigger, not looking where we were shooting, but just keeping our formation and flying straight through the middle of the Germans. With ninety-six machine-guns blazing straight at them, it must have been pretty
Frightening. It had the desired effect and the Heinkels split all over the sky. We were then able to pick them out one at a time. This time, however, as we were going in, I started to be hit by very accurate fire. I could see bullets entering my wings, coming in from directly ahead, and also straight into the engine.”
Oil sprayed all over the cockpit, from the punctured oil cooler at the bottom of the radiator. He pulled out to starboard, and as he banked, bullets were piercing his wings from beneath. He completed his turn and began gliding southward, away from the battle. Immediately, bullets hammered through his aircraft from the rear. “So whoever was doing the shooting was either very lucky or knew a lot about deflection, because it had been constantly changing.”
He jettisoned his oil-smeared cockpit hood and “was about to bail out when I suddenly realized that I was going to fall in the Thames; and I wasn’t particularly keen on that.”
It was a heart-stopping moment. The air was full of hostile fighters and his speed was very slow now that he had no engine. If he did bail out, the odds were that some sporting Luftwaffe pilot would shoot at him as he hung beneath his parachute. Either way, he
Was a sitting duck. He could only hope that other Hurricanes and Spitfires were holding the attention of the enemy enough to divert them from pursuing aircraft which were already out of the fight.
The engine was showing no signs of catching fire, and the oil had run dry and was no longer spurting all over him, so he decided to stay in his machine, glide as far as the Isle of Sheppey, and bail out there. But when he arrived over this small piece of land he saw how unlikely it was that, without knowing the wind direction, he would succeed in landing on it. So he made for the mainland, aware by now that he had enough altimde to glide all the way back to Gravesend.
Pumping the undercarriage and flaps down by hand, he circled the aerodrome to lose height and made a perfectly judged landing. “And finished my run, with a dead engine, right smack beside the point from which I’d taken off. Much to the joy of the newsreel unit, who were busy taking pictures of my landing.”
There were eighty-seven bullet entry holes on Lacey’s Hurricane, and innumerable bigger gashes where lumps of metal, ripped internally from the aircraft, had been smashed right through it.
“I was awfully pleased with myself, having
Brought the aircraft back in that condition; until I eventually saw the engineer officer. His remark was, ‘Why the hell didn’t you bail out? If you’d bailed out of that thing. I’d have got a new aircraft tomorrow morning! Now, I’ve got to set to work and mend it.’ ” Lacey’s postscript is: “It certainly made me change my ideas about what was a good thing and what was a bad thing.”
The pattern of the times is inexorable and appears to be never-ending. Rise at an early hour: 4 A. M., perhaps, certainly never later than six-thirty. Fly standing patrol somewhere around “Hell’s Corner,” the southeast angle of England. Land at Hawkinge. Scramble. . . scramble. . . and scramble again. One more standing patrol, waiting for an enemy who might or might not come. Back to Gravesend. Maybe, a night standby. If not, a hurried visit to someplace where there are ordinary people to mix with and take one’s mind off revs and boost and deflection shots. Finally, a flop into bed and instant sleep, with always the semiconscious appreciation that tomorrow might be one’s last day of life. Or the day after that. Sometime next week at the latest, surely, with the huge enemy formations coming and coming again, and the odds seldom better than five to one.
And still there is room for humor. The growing number of Poles, Czechs, Norwegians, Dutch, Belgians, and Frenchmen appearing on RAF stations gives rise to new problems and birth to new anecdotes. A favorite one is about the Polish airman who, on being told by a station commander that he is to be remanded for a court-martial, drops instantly in a dead faint. It is only when the interpreter explains that, at home, this usually means execution by a firing squad within four hours that the CO understands why it is that he cannot strike similar terror into the hearts of his British airmen. There is another, too, about the foreign nobleman, commanding a unit of his countrymen, who had to be dissuaded from his feudal method of dispensing justice; arguing against the necessity to hear evidence when a man is on a charge, he declares, “If I say he is guilty, he is guilty.” The RAF likes those stories.
The fifth of September. “501 Squadron scramble!”
The familiar voice of the controller. “I’ve got some trade for you coming in from the south. Maintain vector one zero zero, making Angels twenty-five.”
And the CO, matter-of-fact, sounding even indifferent: “Understood. Any idea how many Bandits?”
“Looks like sixty-plus.”
“Good show.”
A few seconds’ pause, then some wit breaks R/T silence with a terrifyingly realistic imitation of machine-gun fire, in the best music-hall style.
But you can’t hide your identity from men with whom you share almost every waking second. The boss, sounding reluctantly amused, tells him to shut up.
The controller again. “What Angels now?” “Just passing through Angels twenty-two.” “Okay. Level out. Trade approaching from south at Angels eighteen.”
“Understood.”
“I’m going to turn you, presently, and bring you in from up-sun.”
“!” The irony in the leader’s acknowledgment is not entirely accidental.
“Bandits three o’clock, range forty. Start turning now onto two seven zero.”
The squadron wheel, turning to their right so that they will face the enemy, who is approaching from the south. They settle down to a due westerly heading, and the controller’s voice gives them some more help. “Bandits now ten o’clock, range fifteen.”
They begin to wriggle on their parachute packs, feeling the chafing of their harness straps as sweat starts involuntarily to run
Over their backs and chests. In their silk gloves, palms grow moist, while mouths feel dry and eyes burn with the concentration of staring, staring, always staring... at the man ahead and the man on your wing. . . at the burning, sunlit sky. . .
“Target should be eleven o’clock, range five —”
And instantly the leader’s exultant “I’ve got ’em. . . . Tallyho! Tallyho!” And the tight wheel, with your heart pounding and your eyes smarting with the glare on those threatening cross-shapes, which are suddenly Messerschmitts and Dorniers and Heinkels in countless numbers. The air around you boils and seethes as you are tossed around and sucked down by slipstream and explosion. Here a bomber goes to smithereens in a mighty thunderclap that almost shatters your Perspex windscreen, as incendiary bullets hit its bomb bays. There a fighter in an inverted, flaming spin — God! You see it is a Hurricane and recognize the letters on its side... so much for your double date that evening to take those two girls to a dance . . . one of them would have to find another partner. . . and now there are three 109s on your tail and you are on the tail of one yourself. Who would get whom first?
Grip the stick, thumb poised over firing
Button. Ease the throttle back a shade... one. . . two. . . three. . . four seconds — would the brute never show signs of damage? Ah! That is better: a puff of smoke. . . another two seconds... a flicker of crimson along the edge of his cowling. . . then, suddenly, the 109 is on its back and a sprawling figure is dropping from its open cockpit.
Look in the mirror, throttle back, watch the three behind overshoot, open the taps again, get the rearmost in your sights. . . one, two, three seconds... a vomit of oil-streaked smoke, the Me staggers, a sliver of metal drums against your cowling. . . you see a wingtip sawn off as you give another burst. . . and the pilot doesn’t get away from that one.
One hour and forty-five minutes later, you land back from the longest operational sortie you have flown to date, but with two more Me-109s confirmed to bring your score up to fifteen.
On the thirteenth of September, they were at Kenley, thirteen miles south of London and four from Croydon, where they had been posted on the tenth.
A fifty-minute patrol yielded nothing, and then the weather deteriorated.
But it wasn’t long before Ops were on the telephone to the crew room to ask for a vol-
Unteer to take off and look for a Heinkel which was somewhere over London. “But,” they warned, “owing to the unbroken cloud everywhere in the southeast, whoever goes will probably be unable to land: it will mean bailing out.”
Lacey said he had always wondered what it was like to bail out, and off he went.
It was a long stalk, and he was airborne for two hours.
The controller guided him eastward, at 14,000 feet, above the solid layer of cloud that covered the whole of the southeast of England. A turn to the south, another to the east; a turn to the southeast, then east again. The controller’s directions were concise and intelligent, but the Heinkel was elusive. Until. . .
“I saw it, slipping through the cloud tops, half in and half out of cloud, making for the coast. I didn’t know where I was, because I hadn’t seen the ground since taking off. I dived down on him and got in one quick burst, which killed his rear gunner. I knew he was dead because I could see him lying over the edge of the rear cockpit. Of course the Heinkel dived into cloud, and as I was coming up behind him, I throttled hard back and dropped into formation on him, in cloud. He turned, in cloud, two or three
Times, still making a generally southeasterly direction, and I’m quite certain he thought he had lost me or that I’d stayed above the cloud. Actually, I was slightly below and to one side. You couldn’t see very well, in cloud, through the front windscreen of a Hurricane, but you could see through the side quarter-panel and I was staying just close enough to keep him in sight through this. I stayed with him in all his turns. He made one complete circle and then carried on southeasterly. Eventually he eased his way up to the top and broke cloud, presumably to see if the fighter was still hanging around. Just as he broke cloud and I was dropping back into a position where I could open fire, the dead gunner was pulled away from his guns and another member of the crew opened up on me, at a range of, literally, feet.
“I remember a gaping hole appearing in the bottom of the cockpit. The entire radiator had been shot away, and I knew it was just a matter of time before the engine would seize, so I put my finger on the trigger and kept it there until my guns stopped firing. By that time he had both his engines on fire and I was blazing quite merrily too. I think it was a glycol fire rather than an oil fire, but what was burning didn’t particularly interest me: I knew that I was burning
And I was going to have to get out.
“As soon as the guns ran out of ammunition, by which time the He - 111 was diving steeply through the cloud, I left the aircraft.
“I came out of cloud in time to see my aircraft dive into the ground and explode. While drifting down, I saw various people running across the fields to where it had crashed. There was one man passing almost underneath me, when I was about five hundred feet up, so I shouted. This chap stopped and looked in all directions, so I shouted again, ‘Right above you.’ He looked up, and I saw that he was a Home Guard.
“As he saw me, he raised a double-barreled shotgun to his shoulder and took aim. I knew it was a double-barreled shotgun because I was looking down the barrels; and they looked like twin railway tunnels!
“I shouted, ‘For God’s sake don’t shoot,’ and amplified it with a lot of Anglo-Saxon words that I happened to know and continued to exhort him not to shoot for the rest of my way down; and added a lot more Anglo-Saxon words.
“Eventually I fell in a field and just sat there, but he still kept me covered with his gun. I said, ‘Hang on a minute while I get at my pocket and show you my identity card.’ He put his gun down and said, ‘I don’t want
To see your identity card: anyone who can swear like that couldn’t possibly be German.’ “I was a little bit singed [his trousers were burned off to the knees] but had beaten out the fire on the way down, and my face was a bit burnt. Not very burnt, because I was always careful to pull my goggles down as soon as I saw an enemy aircraft. I’d seen too many of my friends in hospital who hadn’t pulled their goggles down, and burnt eyes were a pilots’ trademark that I was determined not to get.” He had come down near Leeds Castle, which was the officers’ annexe of the Shorn-cliffe Military Hospital. Here he had an argument with a doctor who wanted to put him to bed; Lacey was determined that he would first telephone the airfield and inform the squadron that he was safe. But, owing to the bombing, there were so many telephone lines down that he had to abandon it after two hours of trying.
“So I told them that they must send me back, and I had to get back before the squadron packed up for the day, otherwise a ‘Missing, believed killed’ telegram would go off to my mother, and I didn’t want her to have that kind of shock.”
The doctor had told him to report sick on returning to camp, so he dismissed the am-
Bulance at the guard room and walked to the officers’ mess to report to his CO. By then, he had on a new pair of trousers which concealed the bums on his legs, “so I was able to go straight back on readiness.”
It was only now that he learned that the Heinkel he had just shot down had bombed Buckingham Palace.
His log-book carries the entry, “Must remember to leave bombers alone in future. They are shooting me down much too often.”
Spitfire Tales
World History
