Issue No.15 Winter 2000

Life President: F.W. (Bill) Cooper, 37 Oakdene, Lansdowne Road, Cheltenham, Glos GL51 6PX. Tel: 01242 255119

Reunion Organiser: E.H. (Ted) Daines 45 Randolf Road, Norwich. NR1 2RU Tel: 01603 660514

Editor: Les Crawley, 10 Cleasby Gardens, Low Fell, Gateshead,NE9 5HL: Tel: 0191 4878734. Email: lescrawley@lineone.net

Articles for publication: Judging by the 'crack' at the reunion there are still many memories to be shared. Keep sending them in. They can be in any form you wish, including email, to:- lescrawley@lineone.net

AD LIB by Email: As a trial we will be sending copies of this issue to some of our members by email - especially overseas where we have the email address. It will save costs, paper, post etc., and it will arrive earlier. If you would prefer to receive via this method please email the Editor.

O.R.B's: Thanks to the kind auspices of associate member Robert Quirk we can now access the Records of 160 . If you would like something checked out - just ask. (Editor)

160 on the Internet: Lists of Squadron Libs: Roll of Honour: Items from the records: See them at :- www.rquirk.com

Once again I have the pleasure of reporting that the reunion was indeed a great success and above all it was well attended. The small token given to the ladies was well received - my thanks to the lady who thought of and conducted this task.

It was pleasing to meet friends from Canada. I believe they had a great time with us as old comrades and friends. When they arrived home, I hope they spread the news that 160 is alive and well and they are not forgotten, perhaps others may make the journey next year

A letter of thanks has been sent to the Falcon Hotel for the part the staff played in making this such a happy occasion.

LONG LIVE 160 SQUADRON

LONG LIVE THE REUNIONS.

At last I can report that all things appertaining to the association, or rather the running thereof, have come to fruition. We have our own bank account, newsletters aptly named 'Ad Lib' and a RAF Heraldry Trust Crest and Dedication: a form of history being compiled and a scrap book kept: an active membership that maintains its numbers within reason and a well attended reunion. The year 1999 - 2000 saw us pay our way - we even have a small credit.

Now the news that Bill Cooper has accepted the Presidency (Life) of the 160 Squadron Association.

This is indeed very good news. Bill, a sufferer from M/S for some twenty odd years has always been a very staunch supporter of the association. He was also compiler of Ad Lib from its outset till it became too much to cope with - in fact, one could call him Mr 160. His records and his knowledge of the squadron are really first class and it was he who promoted the RAF Heraldry Trust Crest and Dedication. May he continue to be there for us for a very long time. (Ted Daines).

Please convey to fellow members of our Association, through the medium of AD LIB, my appreciation of the Honorary Life Presidency bestowed upon me at the recent reunion. It is an honour which I shall treasure always.

Although it is in the nature of my condition that it can never improve, Margot and I are greatly strengthened by the expressions of goodwill which we receive.

Oft times I am reminded of the motto of our service -

Per Ardua Ad Astra - how true ! (Bill Cooper)

(My log book contains the following entry: 20^th June 09.45 FL936 Air/Ground search:Landed 13.35 at China Bay. I am only too well aware that for years I have argued that official records of this crash must have been incorrect as I have the date of 20^th June in my logbook for the search. I have oft times stated that having arrived in the mess for breakfast and seeing many long faces, I had then gone up with my skipper, Leo Davidson, to find the site. I now readily accept the dates given above. Eleven days must have elapsed between seeing the shocked faces in the mess and our flight. Mea Culpa ! FWC).

The "Flypast" article in 1989 (AD LIB No.5) must have this wrong about "N" being a 160 aircraft which crashed on landing at Cocos circa July 1945. The photograph does confirm that it is "N" but the ORB's show that 160's N was BZ 752 which was on strength from July 1943 until struck off charge on 11^th April.1946 and no such crash is recorded. I have asked RAAF if there is any record but with no luck and now await a reply to enquiries re it being a 321 'Dutch' Lib. It was not from either 354 or 99 according to members I have contacted. (Les Crawley)

Anyone can make a mistake!

A few of us were standing on the side of the runway at Sigirya watching an aircraft taking-off for a P R mission over Northern Sumatra. The aircraft took-off towards the Northeast, but instead of turning right on course, it turned left. This was unusual, but we assumed that the captain was making a left-hand circuit before setting course over the airfield. However, the aircraft continued heading westwards and soon disappeared from sight and sound.

We were puzzled by this unusual procedure, thinking that perhaps the captain was following secret instructions of which we were not aware. After ten minutes of fruitless discussion, we heard the sound of an aircraft approaching from the west. We identified our aircraft as it passed overhead the airfield - going east of course.

Later, it was admitted that the captain had misread the setting on his compass and had mistakenly steered a reciprocal course before realising his mistake. This was known in the business as steering red on blue.

For the remainder of his stay on the squadron that captain was stuck with the nickname RED ON BLUE.

One of our aircraft was detailed to participate in a joint exercise with the Far Eastern Fleet in an area well to the south east of Ceylon. The crew was relatively inexperienced and this was an opportunity to acquire knowledge of operating with the Navy. The briefing was to locate the fleet, note its position, identify the major units involved and transmit the information by w/t to 222 Group H.Q. in Colombo.

The initial part of the task was successfully accomplished and the captain passed his report to the W/Op for transmission. The W/Op copied the message into his log and then proceeded to transmit the same in plain language - forgetting first to encode it in SYKO.

Back at Combined Operations H.Q. in Colombo, the Navy hit the roof as details of the fleet, which included the French battleship RICHELIEU, were broadcast in plain English for every listening post in South East Asia to receive.

The exercise was immediately terminated and the fleet put to port. The crew received a severe roasting and the Navy took an extremely dim view of 160 Squadron.

I am ashamed to admit that this one was mine!

We were standing by for immediate repatriation in accordance with an order from Lord Louis Mountbatten that all aircrew who had served more than one year were to be repatriated - "Getting rid of the deadwood" - as he put it.

Morale in the squadron was at a rather low ebb as we had already lost three aircraft to enemy fighters on P R flights. It came, therefore, as an unwelcome shock to be detailed to carry out a P R flight over Port Blair and the Anderman Islands. The order was received by the crew with a marked lack of enthusiasm. One of my Wop/Ags, not noted for his tact, said, indelicately, "This could be our last trip, Skipper!".

We took off and set course for Port Blair, flying at 2000 feet. During the outbound leg, we received a coded message from 222 Group, instructing us to look out for a battleship reported by Intelligence to have left Singapore, bound for Port Blair. The navigator informed us when we were within thirty minutes flying time from the target and we began our routine P R procedure - warm clothing on, flying boot on, intercom tested; guns tested; turbo-superchargers set; mixture to Auto Rich; climb power set - and the climb to our operational altitude of 24,000 feet commenced.

On arrival over the target area there was some scattered cloud but the main area was visible. We started our first p.r. run, following the channel leading to Port Blair harbour. I looked down from the left side window and saw what I thought was the shape of a battleship, with tall superstructure, at anchor in the channel. I called to the rear gunner and the port side blister gunner to avert their eyes momentarily from the skies and look down at the object in the channel. They both confirmed that it looked like a battleship. Unfortunately, we didn't get a second view because of cloud extending over the area.

Having completed our designated p.r. runs, we set course for base and slowly descended to 2000 feet for the return leg, during which I sent a coded sighting report to 222 Group H.Q. Several hours later, we landed back at Sigirya to some excitement. The films were rapidly removed from the cameras and despatched by air to Colombo. The Intelligence Officer advised me to stand by for a possible trip to Combined Operations in Colombo for debriefing.

I took a shower, changed, had a meal in the mess and relaxed with a congratulatory drink. After a while, the I.O. said that I could stand down, as a debriefing was not required. The films had been developed and my sighting identified as a small narrow island, pointed at each end. The superstructure was a line of tall palm trees down the centre of the island, which was surrounded by a maximum depth of six feet of water. To avoid further ribbing in the mess, I slunk off to my room

A few days later my repatriation posting arrived. I joined, together with the crew, a troopship leaving Bombay, 'bound for Old Blighty's shore' as the song goes. To this day, I do not know if my posting went through normal channels or whether it was expedited because of my 'battleship' incident. I didn't like to ask.

After all, anyone can make a mistake! (Dave Flett)

The scrounging of spare parts for the 'cannibalised' aircraft was apparently extremely successful as, when the squadron was posted home from KKS to Leuchars, we were told to assemble 160 tons of spares, which were to go by sea. However this figure was much exceeded and so a large hole was dug at night and the excess spares were buried. (Geoff Wyle)

Part Seven. India here we come !

First the SS Cuba, said to be a converted French meat ship, (Torpedoed and sunk on 6th April 1945 by Ul195 in the English Channel). Second The Nieuw Amsterdam, a converted luxury passenger liner (survived the war) and now HMTS Dunera, a ship of 10,000 tons, built especially for troop carrying (survived the war). This was the ship that was to transport 160 squadron in safety to Bombay, India. We had an escort to protect us, I believe it was a Greek armed trawler, although who was escorting who was debatable as we were continually having to slow down to allow the escort to catch up with us. The Red Sea was not quite as smooth and placid as one would expect it to be and the choppiness and slight swell caused the Dunera to react accordingly - not excessively - just sufficient to cause us a small degree of discomfort, but on average it was quite a comfortable voyage. As usual, my mate Ron Ryall and myself, to avoid the monotony of staring at the sea and sky during the voyage, volunteered for fatigue duties and were detailed to help in the ship's tea canteen. So each day we reported to the merchant seaman i/c these duties and organised morning and afternoon tea breaks, and going by the quantity of supplies that we got through in the approximately ten day voyage it proved to be very popular. At the end of each day, Jack, the seaman in charge put a handful of the takings in our pocket, not even counting how much it amounted to. and told us not to tell anyone. (And this is the first time I have ever mentioned it).

For some reason, not explained, we stopped off at Aden for about a day and a half and we began to wonder if this was to be our destination and not India, but much to our relief we moved on again. The thought of being posted to a bleak, airless place like that was very demoralising. Due to the heat quite a few of the bods slept on the open deck at night, but it was necessary that they were fully alert quite early in the morning otherwise they would have had a wash down, as well as the decks. A few did complain about being disturbed during the night by the creaking of the cable that held the barrage balloon suspended above our decks - (life can be cruel to the poor young airman).

As with all journeys, this one came to an end and we duly arrived off Bombay, disembarked, and formed up on the dockside. With our transit CO, the indomitable "Charlie Hunter" leading, (complete with his "Fly Swat and dandy desert boots"), followed by Ted Daines and his Defence Flight, then the mighty 160, we were marched to Napier Barracks, not without incident. After quite a distance the person leading us confessed that he had forgotten the way, but embarrassment was avoided when an onlooker stepped in and pointed us in the right direction - the reputation of the "Raj" had been saved

We were informed that our stay would be for three days. Half the squadron would have a day pass the next day and the remainder the following day. This gave us all the opportunity to have a quick look around the city. Ron Ryall, Ted Gregory, Cpl Robbie Roberts and myself had a tour in a taxi and then went to the Regal Cinema, although I can't remember the film we saw. On the fourth day we returned to the docks and embarked on the H.M I.T. Rajula a ship of 8,478 tons that was to take thirty six hours to transport us to Karachi. (I have often wondered why the Dunera did not take us direct to Karachi in the first place).

Arrived at Karachi: the first thing I saw was the burnt out hulk of a ship, I believe named the Gothic or some very similar name. We disembarked and proceeded to that renowned RAF staging post, Drigh Road. This was quite an awe inspiring complex and appeared to cover vast areas on both sides of the road, yet as I recall, not a single aircraft in sight. Was it true then about the sad plight of the strength of the Royal Air Force in the far east theatre of war ?

Our accommodation consisted of large clean tents and gave the impression of being comfortable except for the appearance of quite an unwelcome number of big hairy spiders, perhaps they were put there to ensure everyone tucked their mosquito net in securely every night, I know I did. Our camp was on the airfield side of the complex with all of the usual peace time establishment facilities, admin blocks, sports fields, ablutions with hot and cold running water and showers and a canteen where one could get pretty well everything that an airman far from home might feel in need of (except the wife or good old mum of course.)

Within a few days of our being there the squadron was paraded in extreme heat at the end of the runway to await the arrival of and to be inspected by the Duke of Gloucester. As usual on these occasions the gentleman was late arriving and standing on parade in that extreme heat was most unpleasant for the lads. (Lucky me, I missed the parade due to the after affects of a couple of inoculations I had had the previous day).

The Duke duly arrived and within about five minutes the senior officers had whisked him away to have lunch in some nice cool dining room I assume, - he wasn't very popular with the lads after that.

Like myself, Ted also paid a couple of visits to Karachi, also like myself, he didn't find it very inspiring. He took advantage of the cheap egg and chips that were available. I found a restaurant where I had noodles and fried prawns with six fried eggs on top. (In India, I found that eggs were very rarely any larger than small pigeons' eggs so it required six to cover the noodles and prawns).

Ted also remarked about seeing the large airsheds at the staging post, built in the 1930s for housing the airships that it was hoped would be the future main provider of air travel, but the tragic crash of the RIOl put paid to that. He remembers watching the R1Ol fly over his home town of Norwich, a truly magnificent sight.

Once again it was time to pack our kit bags, this time for a move to Quetta in Baluchistan - to get acclimatised we were told. I often wonder if Warrant Officer Little Joe Cook the squadron SWO was the person who formed the famous tour company of that name.

The train journey to Quetta was something that needed to be experienced to fully appreciate the atmosphere, the monotony, the wonderful sights etc.; but I will do my utmost to convey these things to those who were unfortunate not to have been with us on that journey in 1942.

I recall leaving KKS in July 1946 and could have been on the second, third, maybe fourth flight of three Liberators. The Lib I flew with, as ground maintenance support, was "Y" for Yoga. This was not a new aircraft. On joining 160 at KKS I was assigned to "Y" as part of the team who serviced her. Many of you may recall she was Sqdn Leader Joy's kite. She behaved well on the journey home and gave no cause for concern.

No ! It's a sample of one of the nickels (leaflets) dropped in their tens of thousands by 160.