Waiting and Luck in the war

 In parallel with modern-day waiting, like for deliveries, taxis, post, queues and such, a lot of my war was  waiting, but on a larger scale, mainly for the nsext posting on my way to becoming a pilot. Tedious it may have been but, in looking back, it was often accompanied by good luck.

On returning from America to join the RAF in 1942 in a convoy when we were attacked by German U-boats, I was accepted into the AF, given a number and told to wait.

Just that I managed to get back to England instated and in one piece was luck. The RAF was much in need of pints at that time, but conditions for learning to fly in England were meteorologically not conducive for novices. So I had to wait for a pilot-training vacancy abroad where the weather was free of clouds.

Not yet in uniform, I took a job as a farm labourer to help, in a very small way, to feed the nation. And in doing this very manual work I came nearest to the enemy in the entire war. Weeding in the middle of a field one day, a German Ju88 twin-engined bomber flew low and so close to my head that I could see the pilot and gunner quite clearly. They were on their mission to bomb the railway station at Reading. That I am able to write this is that the gunner failed to pull the trigger and shoot me dead. That was a real slice of luck during a wait.

My next job was as a prop-swinger at the RAF Theale. Dangerous I am sure it was in starting aeroplane engines by swinging the propeller and falling back at the same time. But through good luck I not only survived but also had the luck to obtain flying experience in the second pilot's cockpit when it was available.

Wait over, I was at last in uniform and flying my first solo flight at RAF Shellingford, which consisted of no more than a farmer's grass field.  No luck was needed there as I now had some experience in the air.

The next wait was, I suppose, the most dangerous.

To give trainee pilots a taste of real combative action was to farm us out to operational RAF stations to experience the real thing. My first and most interesting posting was to RAF  Davidstowe Moor in Cornwall to fly in the second pilot's seat in twin-engined Warwick aircraft. Each sortie was to fly out over the Bay of Biscay to find and then drop a lifeboat to save downed aircrew. Whereas pilot, gunners and all were looking down at the sea, my job was to keep an eye out for German, four-engined Condors for which we were no match. I did see one before they saw us. We were slow and poorly armed by comparison, but escaped unhurt. That was a real stroke of luck.

After another wait, I was posted to RAF Skellingthorpe, in Lincolnshire. This was one of the airfields from which Lancaster bombers left to bomb Germany at night. I took the place of a rear gunner in an engine-testing flight up to Scotland and back. Except for the remote chance that a German raider could intercept us, it was a case of not needing much luck, but luck it was.

Another posting was to RAF Hornchurch and another wait, where I volunteered to mend slate roofs in   Plumstead that had been broken in German bombing raids. 

One of the first V2 rocket-propelled bombs to land in England fell within earshot. It was luck that I was a good distance away, just as I had been from Buzzbombs falling in central London when I was on leave.

At last the Hornchurch wait was over and I was off to America to become a pilot in Oklahoma. 

This was my third wartime crossing of the Atlantic by ship in a sea thick with Nazi U-boats. Not to have been torpedoed was real luck.

I write this just after the 75th anniversary of VE Day, the television pictures of which I found very interesting and joyful. Referring to my logbook I see that on that particular day in America we were given a day off, flying in formation the day before and in the Link Trainer the day after.

Pilots were no longer needed in Europe, but for the Americans the Pacific war was very much in progress. Fortunately there were enough of our skilled pilots to fly in the fight against Japan, so novice pilots like me were redundant. Luck again.

I returned to England by sea and became a Photographic Intelligent Officer until my turn came to be demobilised. My task held no risk as it was a desk and stereoscope job concerned with why the Germans had taken so many aerial photographs of oil installations in the area close to the north of the Caspian Sea. During this wait period I qualified to become a medical student but on release from the RAF it was found that I had TB of the lung (then incurable). So my luck rather ran out then.

I never liked having to wait so much in wartime.  But I did like the good luck that seemed to coincide with it.

And I have always thought that had I been born a year earlier I would almost certainly have been killed in flying operations over Germany, such was the mortality rate of aircrew. So perhaps all this waiting did, in fact, help to save my life. 

That's luck alright.

Crossing the Atlantic by Ship in War time

 I crossed the Atlantic Ocean four times during World War 2. Well, the last time was when the European war was over but the Pacific war raged, thus making the fourth Atlantic crossing a safe one.

In 1940, when I was 15 years old and at school, my mother heard of an American family who wanted to give safe shelter to an English refugee. Fearing a Nazi invasion and what went with it, she thought that one of our family should survive and asked me if I wanted to go. I did - and went.

THE FIRST CROSSING (10 days)

On the 24th of July 1940 I took a train alone from London to Liverpool, there to board a liner, The Duchess of Richmond, bound for Canada. We sailed right away.

I shared a cabin with three others, mentioning in my brief notes that there was a very pretty girl next door, that we were all seasick, Camel cigarettes were 7 1/2 for 20, and we passed two envoys at sea. After four hours navigating the scenic St Laurence River we docked in Montreal on the 4th of August 1940, where I was met by kind Mr and Mrs Killorin, who were to care for me in the USA.

So my first crossing of the Atlantic had been uneventful. Although German U-boats prowled the ocean, word had it that the speed of our ship offered safety. Anyhow, a Canadian destroyer kept us company as we neared Canada.

I noted briefly that it seemed funny not to be carrying a gas mask, no air raid shelters were to be seen, and that no one bothered with blackouts. Somaliland had fallen to the Italians. I was far from any conflict, in a peaceful environment and, surprisingly, in a very foreign land.

I met much friendship by those in the New World. Sent to Taft School, peopled by rich American boys, I did not fit in at all. Penniless, I sold magazine subscriptions in my spare time to have enough cash for ice cream and fizzy drinks.  An occasional censored letter arriving from England was my only contact with home.  Not being a smart American, I was sent to a trade school, where I learned how to draw teeth for cog-wheels.

Fortunately I got to know another misfit who played the clarinet and sculpted in wood. He lived nearby above his family's garage. His rather Bohemian life appealed to me. I treasured a friendship that may well have had a bearing on my future life.

At last I was old enough to return to England to join the RAF with a view to becoming a pilot. 

SECOND CROSSING (28 days)

I joined a three-island, Swedish passenger cargo ship, the Axel Johnson, in New York on the14th of June 1942. We sailed north up the East Coast of new England toward Nova Scotia, in Canada. The engine failed off Cape Cod, but we got going again, arriving in Halifax to have a new crankshaft fitted. We then formed up with around 40 other ships on the 29th of June to become part of a motley convoy to cross the Atlantic. Guarded by a Canadian destroyer, we set forth at the speed of the slowest ship (probably one of the old coal-burning vessels).

Having been fairly safe off the American coast, we were now about to venture through seas inhabited by active wolf packs of German submarines. The destroyer returned to Canada. We were unprotected, more so when we broke down yet again and the convoy pushed on over the horizon. But we got going and caught up with the rest. However, our position was now at the outside of the convoy, and thus vulnerable.

I returned for bed on the evening of the 6th of July. On turning up for breakfast on the 7th, there was much commotion. During the night we were attacked by submarines. The passengers and crew boarded the lifeboats and there were many explosions. I had slept through the lot. Many ships with supplies for the UK were no longer with us, presumably sunk with, I'm sure, terrible loss of life.

An English destroyer saw us into Liverpool docks on the 12th of July 1942. I noted in my diary that two years away was "a mighty long time". I was home and about to sign up for action.

THE THIRD CROSSING (9 days)

I was now in the RAF as the lowest form of human life and destined to complete my flying training back in the USA, this time in Oklahoma in the mid-west.

I sailed from Liverpool on the 30th of December 1944 in the New Mauritania as the airman in charge of  the fruit store. It was a cold job, but with plenty of fruit to eat after having experienced strict rationing in England. Again, our speed saved us from falling victim to U-boats, but had there been disaster, my chances of getting out of that fruit store would have been much like getting out of a safe. But all was well. We arrived in Moncton, New Brunswick, on the 7th of January 1945.

In America I was awarded my wings and, fortunately, not asked to join the war in the Pacific. There were many more experienced pilots to do that.

FOURTH CROSSING (6 days)

Now, as a pilot and officer, it was wonderful to be on a great ship. The Queen Elizabeth.  She had been turned into a grey troopship, adorned with no frills whatsoever. Now, with German U-boat captains having surrendered and been sent home, there was a great feeling of satisfaction and relief by all on board. We sailed from New York on the 4th of September 1945 and docked in Southampton on the 10th of September. This last stay in America had, for me, been a very satisfactory milestone in my life, and a fourth Atlantic crossing to savour.  

The last day of my week as cook (Sunday)

 I got up around 6 o'clock, glanced at the studio work in progress, dealt with ablutions and prepared breakfast before walking down the road to buy the paper.

I took breakfast, a dish which might vary from day to day, to Margreet in bed, where we read some of the paper and discuss the forthcoming day. If I haven't a new idea for breakfast, or leftovers to manipulate, we generally have toasted, home-made bread with butter and Marmite.

I go back upstairs to make a mark or two with pastel, then go down to do the washing up from the day before or even longer. This washing up will be of plates, glasses and bowls that will have been soaking in detergent water and thus almost clean already.

I peel potatoes for lunch and boil them for 10 minutes before adding them to the baking tin in which already lies half a free-range chicken coated in yoghurt, garlic and turmeric. The spuds are coated in oil (I use groundnut oil) and pepper and salted to be ready to be cooked in the oven later for lunch.

In the garden I take another look at the sport section of the paper and watch unseen zephyrs of wind moving individual vine leaves, and feel the draught from a bumblebee's wings. We both admire the runner beans - large, no longer for eating, but growing still for next year's seed and, in their dried form, for stews and finger-eating when boiled and coated with garlic and olive oil for "bites" with drinks. 

Margreet had returned the day before with lots of apples from her sister's garden which she peeled before I cut off the "meat". This went into a saucepan to be heated down to pulp with sugar and lemon juice. The pips, cores and skins went into another saucepan to be heated down with brown sugar and sieved to form a coating for the  pies.

Then I made the short crust pastry to line three tins (one pie to eat and two to give away). Into them went the white pulp, and on it was poured the brown, sieved juice. 

Actually I shouldn't have added any baking powder or sodium bicarbonate to the pastry as it rose too much when cooking, which forced up the pulp when hot and absorbed moisture from the pulp when cooling.

I peeled some home-grown shallots, given by Margreet's niece, and added them to the potatoes around the chicken.

It was time for a cold beer in the hot garden.

Oven on. the pies came out after 25 minutes to cool down, and the chicken later in time for Sunday lunch.

After lunch it was snooze time, before watering the plant pots that were suffering in the heat and take the kitchen compost bin down to empty into the large garden bin. To be emptied the following spring, the nicely smelling compost will improve soil quality and provide nourishment to plants.

I tried minimal heat under a frying pan to sear the green part of chard leaves in garlic and olive oil as "bites" for evening aperitifs, but without great success. I'll try again.

In the evening warmth we enjoyed a glass of cold white wine from Eastern Australia and tested an ordinary Rioja. Both were adequate, but not special.

Our supper dish was complicated. It started earlier in my week as a lovely beef stew with tomato juice as its liquid, became a curry, and finally for this evening a stew with stuffed vine leaves added. It was excellent although the vine leaves that I had stuffed a few days before were a little on the chewy side, being made with older, summer leaves. The stuffing was good, using Arborio rice, minced lamb, lemon zest, lemon juice and chopped mint.

We ate some of the apple pie, which was better than I thought it would be.

It was time for bed. I wanted to watch a Formula 1 Grand Prix on television, but racing cars just going around and around send me to sleep. And 95 years olds do need rest.

Tomorrow it will be Margreet's week  to cook. 

Toad-in-the-Hole

Historically, toad-in-the-hole is an ancient British dish. My Dutch wife had never even heard of it and, I imagine the French would turn up their noses at the very thought of toad-in-the-hole (despite relishing frogs' legs) because it is connected with that dreadful reputation of culinary ineptitude in Britain that was once the butt of international jokes. 

Toad-in-the-hole was a favourite of my youth.Now, because of a recently established tradition, it has become the expected main course when a friend is invited to dine with us each year on Christmas Eve.

The snag is that trying many varieties of sausage every year and not being as I really wanted it to be, it is only recently that this hearty dish of sausages in batter has become a total success.

This success is partly due to a piece in one of those coloured newspaper supplements where the cook/author had made a simple dish of it far too elaborately and time-consuming in preparation. But it had a most useful tip concerning the batter.

The search for a successful batter and how to cook it is not the advice once given me by a Yorkshireman, who said that it should be put together just before the dish was to go in the oven. That it should rest beforehand, learned from this article, would seem now to be essential. So make the batter at least an hour or more before cooking the toad. Let's deal with the batter first, based on my own pancake mix. The volumes are enough for two people, with possibly some batter not consumed, which can be heated up and eaten later. 

In a bowl put three and a half dessert spoonfuls of plain flour, a pinch of turmeric (for colour only and not at all essential) and a little salt. Whisk it together. Make a well in the middle and into it break two eggs. Break up the eggs with the whisk and slowly add a quarter of a pint of milk as you whisk it. The batter will be formed. Make sure that you beat out all the lumps. Put this batter aside to rest and, should you pass by it, give it another whisk for good measure.

Now for the sausages. Before it became fashionable for sausages to be filled mostly with meat and be rather solid, the old British banger was harder to find, blander, and made of finely minced pork, plenty of fat (lard) a few spices and a lot of rusk. I buy a packet of Richmond 12 Thick Pork Sausages. These complement the batter as the batter complements the sausages.

Now you will need a baking tin in which to put plenty of oil (I use groundnut) and, if wanted and available, some lard (make sure that the sides of the tin are coated as well). Add and arrange the sausages (two a person) on the oil. To cook the dish you will need to remember only two numbers 

- 20 and 200. 

That's it. That's all.