Having lost Indomitable, 800 Squadron now found time to re-equip with the new Mark IIb and IIc Hurricane. It was a famous squadron and Spike King-Joyce and I were lucky to have been appointed to it. Bill Bruen was well known and much respected. This allowed him to get his own way with higher authority, and he was always a firm ally to help us when we had our brushes with the upholders of ‘Good Order and Naval Discipline’. The Senior Pilot, Hamish Muir-Mackenzie, was one of the few ex-Dartmouth Lieutenants flying at that time. He played the piano furiously, mostly ominous-sounding stuff like Rachmaninoff’s C Sharp Minor Prelude. Like Barry Lyster and a few others he flew fighters more or less as a pleasurable pastime, although his first love was music. He usually got lost when he led us round England, but when he flew with us round Scotland he knew every inch of the ground. Indeed, so well, that if he suddenly recognised a crag or a mountain a few hundred feet away while flying in and out of the clouds with us, he would suddenly alter course without warning and leave us to catch up as best we could. Seldom did we arrive at our destination at the same time. Sometimes we were days apart. However, since only four out of the 13 in 800 Squadron were not already experienced pilots, we seldom came to grief. There were many old hands: John Hastings, ‘Junior’ Young of rhino fame, Andrew (A. J.) Thomson, Maurice Bannister, Dougy Yate, Ron Outwin, Bill Roberts, Roy Hooker (RNZNVR) and ‘Sammy’ Hoare. There was also Midshipman ‘Roncers’ Roncoroni (RNR). ‘Greyhound’ Thompson was my Number Two, and, or course, there was Spike King-Joyce as the third Flight Leader, besides Hamish and Bill.
Exceptionally, I was given permission to live ashore with my wife in a hotel. Its cost was borne out of my normal pay and hers, as there was no marriage allowance under twenty-five.
Our new Hurricanes were armed with 12 x .303 inch Brownings or four 20 mm Hispano cannon. They had ex-bomber Mark XX Merlin engines, with a nominal 1460 hp take-off power. This was 300 more horsepower than the Mark Ib Hurricane. The Mark II was also fitted with a new two speed super-charger. The two speed gear changed automatically at about 10,000 feet to higher gear whenever the maximum boost fell below about eight pounds per square inch. However, as the gearing took an extra two hundred horsepower out of the engine to drive the turbine — although the final power output was much greater than the Mark I Hurricane — it used fuel at a frightening rate. As the Pilot’s Notes of those days contained only the most rudimentary ‘do’s and don’ts’, many of us had to find these things out for ourselves.
The four cannon were by far the best improvement to this new Mark. They were what we had been waiting for. The 20mm guns fired at 700 rounds per minute, very fast for a cannon, and could do lethal damage to an aircraft at 400 yards range. They could be armed with ball, armour piercing or incendiary/explosive shells. They had a muzzle velocity of about 2000 feet per second, or about twice the speed of sound.
Greyhound and I managed to get to 35,000 feet in our Hurricane IIcs one day. We were frozen stiff and could only manage an indicated airspeed of 85 knots, flat out. Of course we also did other, more useful exercises, including crosscountry navigation, shooting off our new cannon at a wreck off Selsey, formation flying in cloud and quarter attacks using the camera gun. Much to the annoyance of Ventnor radar we also managed the odd shoot-up down the river Hamble and over my father’s nursery.
We had only been in civilisation for three weeks when Bill called us into his office and regretfully had to tell us that once more we had to face the rigours of the north.
It was difficult to climb out of a beautiful warm bed, unwind the soft arms of my exquisite blond immobile Wren and tear myself away for the next seven months.
‘Press tit’ time was 0630 on 17th September 1942. We all got away in good order, not forgetting to shoot up the sleeping officers’ mess. We set course for Hatston in the Orkneys, via Finningley, Drem and Lossiemouth. We had fine weather over the Scottish mountains and the Senior Pilot behaved quite well. We were able to follow his every move.
On the 1st of October, four of us flew south again to Henlow. There we had our wings modified to allow us to carry two 45-gallon long range fuel tanks under each wing. Thereafter we could almost make the 700 mile journey from Lee-on-Solent to Hatston in one go. On the way back we hit some fog and were forced down at RAF Crosbie-on-Eden in Lancashire. Next morning dawned ‘loud and clear’, so we started up and taxied out. We did a formation take-off in pairs and then, at the request of air traffic control, we did a gentle shoot up.
This annoyed the Group Captain in Command who reported us to Bill Bruen. “Crosley, you’d better bring your three chaps in to me. The Group Captain is very angry. He said he had to duck as you came past and his hat came off, so that’s how near it was.”
“Well, sir, the air traffic people asked us specially to do it. They said that they had no thrills at all at Crosbie. I would never think of doing such a thing unless they had asked me.”
I heard nothing more of it. It was becoming so common at that time and so many cows were giving birth to premature calves and so many retired Colonels were spilling their sherry that something had to be done. Otherwise, perhaps, the Group Captain might have welcomed the idea and waved his hat at us as well. But you never knew with Group Captains.
Hatston airfield in the Orkneys had happened. It had never been designed. It had grown up from a landing ground often used in peacetime by RN officers and others who had their own aircraft in which to fly south during the mating season. When war came and it needed a runway for Skuas and such, the main road was closed permanently to cars and opened for aeroplanes. Hangars and Nissen huts were added, blast bays were dug, an air traffic control tower was built and it became the premier Royal Naval Air Station in the north. The Captain had been carefully chosen for his strict husbandry of Naval Stores and the First Lieutenant for his immaculate conception of all things disciplinary. So it happened that when I was Duty Air Officer one night, I fell foul of Number One.
The routine was that the Duty Air Officer was responsible for the safety of the aircraft parked out in the open in the blast bays or in the hangars. He had to do ‘rounds’ from time to time with a torch and a Petty Officer, to count them and make sure they were still there. He would then sign as having done so in the Log Book in the Air Watch Tower. This was normal procedure at any Naval Air Station. However, those at other Naval Air Stations, the ones in the south, had some reasonable types as the Station non-flying officers. They were human. But some of those at Hatston must have been sent there for some special reason, perhaps they were so efficient, so observant, and such a pain in the neck that no ship would have them. So they were given shore jobs which did not matter much. Whatever the reason, we seemed to have a right bunch at Hatston.
I had just turned-in after doing my rounds at 0200. Directly my head had touched the mattress — there were no pillows or sheets — the phone went and I was summoned to Air Traffic Control. It was the voice of the First Lieutenant and could not be denied. I groped and slanted my way through a 60 knot gale to the Tower, found the Log and read: “Hurricane 261 — a gaping hole in the fuselage through which ice and snow could enter”.
I pushed my way out into the black screaming night, heading towards the blast bay where I knew Hurricane 261 was. It was one of 800 Squadron’s aircraft and its crew had left it well covered up and lashed down. I searched the aircraft for the gaping hole. All I could find was the hand-hold for climbing up onto the wing, designed by Sydney Camm for that purpose.
When I got back to the Tower, I signed the Log with the remarks: “Hole inspected. It was designed thus by Sydney Camm, Esq.”
The First Lieutenant had not heard of Sydney Camm and thought I was trying to be funny, which of course I was. I had to go and see the Captain. He told me that it was lucky that we were going aboard Biter next day, otherwise he would have ‘Logged’ me for impertinence.
Accordingly, next morning, I and eight others in the squadron fell into the back of three Swordfish and landed on Biter. The rest of the squadron followed behind in four Hurricanes. We then carried out decklanding practice. As a 50 knot wind was still blowing, Biter steamed round into the lee of the headland and turned into wind. We did our arrivals with her making bare steerage way and pitching ten feet or more, with rain squalls included. Pilot Officer Jack would not have allowed such a thing. We had to make very large and ‘ham’ corrections to try to keep steady on the approach. The turbulence and wind shear astern of the ship was frightening and reminded me of my experience at North Front. There was only one accident, however, a skid into the island by Ivan Scanes.
When we got back to Hatston that night, Muir-MacKenzie was hard at the Rachmaninoff again. Watching the decklandings had done his nerves no good. However, Greyhound told us five more stories about a racing greyhound — that was always getting its owner into trouble. Junior Young also recounted his rhino adventures in darkest Africa and Tich Madden, flying F4F four Wildcats of 882 Squadron in Victorious was also on hand. (I had seen a Wildcat coming in to land without a pilot, so I knew that Tich must have been around.) Twelve of us flew on board Biter on the 14th of October. This time we stayed, for we were going to the Mediterranean again. We were glad to see the last of the mighty aurora borealis and the First Lieutenant each night at Hatston. Morale was high.