AN
ACCOUNT BY MR
TOM ROSSITER
as told to
AVM Peter Scully (rtd)
on 27th April 1996
I was born on 12 Aug 1924, and we moved to East Malvern
when I was three. I went to school at St
Mary's primary and later to De La Salle College. I started work at the age of 15 - nice and
early in life I suppose compared with these days.
In 1940, when I was 16, the Air Training Corps started to
flourish and No 4 Sqn was opened up in Malvern.
Myself and a couple of mates,
Jack Balwyn, who also finished up in the Air Force and Ian Hocking - I
don't know what happened to him later on - joined. I had two years with the ATC then I went
into the Air Force on 15 Dec 1942, as an aircrew guard.
I finished up down in Tasmania. True to advice my father gave me of never
volunteering for anything, when we finished our basic training at Shepperton
they said, "Well, seeing that you were kind enough to rally to the call to
allow the real guards to be posted up to the Darwin area, to relieve the
situation up there, we'll post you as near as possible to home. So you name three places you'd
prefer." So I said to myself,
"Oh, I'll be smart I'll put Point Cook as No 1 because that's furthest
from home, Laverton No 2 and Ascot Vale which was an embarkation
depot". That was on the train line
so I wouldn't have any trouble travelling.
So I finished up in Tasmania, at Western Junction, at No 7 EFTS. It was quite good and we started to learn
very quickly.
From there I went to Somers, on 35 course and was then
posted to Canada. However, when they found out I was only 18, they took
me off the draft and sent me to Parkes in NSW to do my training. I finished up in gunnery school at Port
Pirie.
Q. Was there and age limit before going overseas.
It was 19 at that stage.
As I wasn't quite 19 they said, "Well that's it; you can stay
here." When I finished my training
I didn't get posted directly overseas, but was posted to Nhill as a staff
wireless operator. Nhill was an air
navigation school. I was there for a
couple of months and then three of us were posted to Sale to go onto
Beauforts. When we left Nhill, they
told us that we would have to go via Ascot Vale because they were not ready for
us down at Sale yet. So we finished up
at the embarkation depot at Ascot Vale and it transferred to the Cricket Ground
while we were there. The next thing, a
chap named Trevor Dennis, Ron McIntyre and myself, the three of us, were all on
a draft to go to England. How that
happened, I don't know. None of us were
given any injections, which we thought was a bit strange, although our pay
books, when we did get them, showed that
we had been injected. I found out the
reasons many years later after the war.
I bumped into a fellow on the same draft and he said, "Just before
we went overseas, two blokes and myself were dragged in for a second lot of
injections and we couldn't figure out why." Evidently, what they had done was to enter
all the paybooks as everybody having had injections and then they found out
that they were three over, so they grabbed the first three blokes and this chap
happened to be one of them...so he got a double dose. We went without them for the rest of the
war.
We went via America and
when we got to New York we were
told that we would be moving out fairly shortly. We'd only been there about four days
when another lot came through and they
were shunted up to Canada to catch a trip over the England. It turned out that they got the drafts mixed
up there again. We had two weeks in New
York, over Christmas ... it was magnificent.
They were very good to us the American people and they looked after us
really well. You only had to step out
onto the footpath and you were invited out.
They were very, very good. This
was at the end of 1943. We eventually
left the US about New Year.
The next 10 days would have to be the worst 10 days I
ever had in the Air Force. We were on a
ship called the Summeria. It was
overcrowded; two meals a day and the
food was terrible; you had to sleep in your clothes and in your Mae West as
well. We went across the Atlantic at
about 8 knots in convoy with about 120/130 ships and it took 10 days from New
York to Liverpool. There were only 100
of us and the ship was packed with Americans, including 1500 American WAACS. The conditions weren't very good and I bet
they were glad to get off it as well.
Then we went to Brighton and shortly after we arrived
there we met Dave Beyer, who looked after us.
Then we just started our training, going through the normal routine of
Radio School, Advanced Flying Unit, OTU and then onto Heavy Conversion Unit,
and then onto a squadron. The first
aircraft we struck, atYatesbury which was the radio school, was a DH 86. It was twin engined and took about 6 of
us. Then we went up to Scotland to the
AFU and we were back onto Ansons. We
used to fly out over the Irish Sea towards Ireland. Then onto Wellingtons, then Stirlings and
then Lancs.
Q. Were you fully trained as a wireless operator/ air gunner in
Australia before you left ?
The equipment we had here was vastly different from that
which we used in England. But as far as
learning morse, we had a magnificent instructor at Parkes. He came from Radio Australia in Singapore. You had to be able to send and receive at 18
WPM in those days. This chap was so good
that we all did 22-25 WPM without any trouble at all. At that time there weren't many operators at
that level. When I left Parkes I could
send and receive at 25 - that's how good
he was. The operational speed was 18,
you might get somebody sending at 20, but normally only 18. One of the instructors at the radio school
at Yatesbury, a sergeant, was
hopeless. We told him to take a seat down
the back and we'd do our own. He didn't
mind, but we were all flight sergeants then and it was a bit embarrassing.
Q When did you start to mix up the nationalities.
Once you crewed up - on OTU. Until then we stayed more or less together.
We went through Yatesbury and then to No 4 AFU at West Freugh, Scotland (near
Stranraer on the West coast) - we were all Australians there. From there we were posted to different OTUs
and that's where we crewed up. I went to
29 OTU at Bruntingthorpe. They gave us
48 hours, I think. They said, "Get
yourself together and get youselves crewed and after that time if you haven't
done it then we'll do it for you."
The first bloke I joined up with was the rear gunner. He happened to be in the mess one day and I
was talking to him and he said, "Have you done anything yet ?" and I
said, "No". So he said,
"Oh you look all right, how about we start together." "Righto" I said. There were two navigators, one was a bloke
named Bill Pearce and the other Frank Bennett - our bloke, but we didn't know
that at the time. We'd met them
somewhere along the line and they managed to get themselves a pilot each - both
by the name Martin - Harry Martin and the other Clem Marten. They both came from South Australia. We finished up, the rear gunner, Bruce Wyllie
and myself with Frank Bennett who was an
Englishmen too and we were with Harry Martin and there were four of us. Then we picked up another gunner, who didn't
last long - he shot through, as a matter of fact, and we had to get
another. The pilot and myself were the
only Australians, the others were all English.
We got a bombaimer who was a Welshman and we picked up an engineer later
on - also English. The bombaimer was a
bloke named Jones and it all came to head with him at HCU.
Young as I was, I thought there was something wrong with
him up top, because he was so erratic. We
had a night bombing exercise to do and he made a complete mess if it. I said to Harry, "Look, I think you'd
better think about getting rid of him, otherwise he'll give us all problems
later on." "Oh", he said
"I can't do that".
"Well," I said, “I think
you'd better talk it over with all the crew." They all agreed that he had to go. So we got rid of him and then it looked like
we'd done the wrong thing, beacuse we found it hard to pick up another
bombaimer. When that happens they split the crew up and stick you out with
other crews who were looking for particular categories. At the crucial time, one turned up, another
Englishman named Eric Bridges and he was a good bloke. So all in all we finished up with a pretty
good crew. Especially, we had a good
pilot and a good navigator, which is very, very important.
Q. Was there a tendency for Australians to crew up with other
Australians ?
No, you see the situation was .......I finished up in 5
Group. 463 and 467 were the main
Australian squadrons in 5 Group. Now where they got their crew from, I don't
know, but they were all Australians. So
obviously they had OTUs that fed those two squadrons, but the OTU that I
finished up on was an RAF one - No 29 at Bruntingthorpe - and they fed you to
whatever squadron needed you I suppose.
463 and 467 were at Waddington and that had been, I understand a
permanent RAF station. We finished up
on one of the makeshift ones that appeared during the war. The squadron I finished up on, is still
going - one of the oldest RAF squadrons around - flying Hercules I think. We went from OTU to No 1661 HCU at Winthorpe
- Stirlings. They were a beautiful
aircraft to fly in but they wouldn't go too high...I think their ceiling was
about 12-14000 feet.. with a bomb load.
From there we went to what they called a Lanc finishing school at a
place called Syerston which was also a
permanent RAF base. We arrived there at
the end of 1944 which was pretty cold, but the quarters were all heated which
was a big plus, I can tell you. At one
stage just before Christmas 1944, it was down to 16 below - everything was
frozen, even the water tanks. It was
the time of the battle of the bulge in Europe and our aircraft couldn't get off
the ground and that's when the Germans decided to break out and have a real
go. I think there were 10 days to a
fortnight when aircraft could not even get off the deck.
When we got to the
squadron - back to nissan huts - all the water was frozen and you couldn't get
a shower. You had to go down to the mess kitchen to get a bucket
of water to have a wash. It was pretty
rugged there for a while - still, you can't do much about the weather. We got to the squadron in late January 1945
and we were there until June.
Q. Can you talk about any of your operational experiences on the
squadron ?
I know the first one pretty well, I can never forget that
as long as..... They generally gave the
green crews a short trip to shake you in.
Well, our short trip was 10 hours 15 minutes. There wasn't much fuel left in the tanks - I
think the capacity was only 10 and a half hours. We went to Dresden. It was quite an initiation, to say the
least. Fortunately, we were in the
first wave to go in, because they tell me that when the second lot got there,
which was about two hours later, the place was well and truly alight. Later, all the kerfuffle was made, and a lot
of people complained ....well, I suppose
a lot of people did die but.....
Q. Was that a contentious issue even back then ?
No. As far as we were concerned, it was just another
target. There was supposed to be a
build up of German troops, hindering the Russian advance - whether there was or
not, I wouldn't know. People say that
wasn't true, but that was what we were led to believe. It was a trip and that was it.
Q. Was there much opposition along the way, over Germany at that
stage ?
There was a bit, but we were wet behind the ears I
suppose. But the big thing was, as I
said before, we had a good navigator and as it turned out we were in the centre
of the stream almost all the way there and back. There were roughly 250 aircraft, in the
first lot. The next lot, about half
past one in the morning was 530, and the
Americans went in about 5 hours later with another 530. That was why there was not much left of
it. It's unfortunate, but I don't know
if you've read the story of the infamous Hamburg raid, well it turned out to be
a carbon copy of that. The conditions were
such that the place was ready to burn - the heat generated and the wind and it
got out of control in no time flat.
We finished up doing 14 trips - almost a half tour. Then we did three POW runs after that. That was quite an experience to see these
chaps who couldn't really believe that they were going home. They were so relieved to know it was all
over, much more so than we were, because we didn't have to suffer the privation
that they did.
Q When you did those trips, did you have medical people with
you ?
No. We just went
and picked them up. I honestly didn't
know how we fitted them in because we had 24
POWs in a Lanc plus seven crew.
They were all forward of the mid-upper turret. It was a tight squeeze, there was no way
anyone would have got out if anything had happened. (There were no parachutes for them
anyway). It was an amazing
exercise. We went to a place called
Juvincourt in France for the second trip, which happened to be 8th May - VE Day
- . We got over there at half past eight in the morning, and the Lancs would
come in and get on the end of a line - I don't know how many aircraft there
were - hundreds - there were aircraft everywhere. It was very well organised. You'd get a number when you landed and when
your turn came to go up then up you went.
We were there all day and didn't get back to base until eight o'clock
that night. You can imagine what the
place was like by then - they'd drunk it dry - there was not a thing left. So we had to make up for it the next night.
We didn't leave England until
October - got back here on cup eve.
Funny thing, I missed the boat. I
could have got a position flying in Japan, but I found about it a day too late. It was flying in Dakotas, but it would have
been an experience too. I would have
been happy to go. A mate of mine went,
he stayed in for another two years, and he enjoyed it.
Q. How many Australians were there on your squadron ?
No a great many - about 5 %.
Q. Was there any tendency for separate groups to form on the
squadron ?
No, there was nothing like that at all. The longer you were on the squadron, the
closer you got. Being in aircrew, in
Bomber Command, was a unique experience.
There were seven fellows who flew together, lived together and played
together and you really didn't get to know anybody else intimately. Your whole world revolved about these six
other fellows. It was imperative that
the whole seven worked in harmony, otherwise the inevitable happened. People who became relaxed, or didn't
concentrate on what they were supposed to be doing..... When you read the stories of crews who
didn't make it. ....it's obvious. I
had mates who were killed shortly after going onto the squadron, and while we
were going through training together.
Those fellows always had a problem with someone in the crew. Our first bombaimer, would have been our
main problem had we kept him on - there's no doubt about that. What happened to him after he left us, I
don't know. I don't know what their attitude
was to people who were asked to leave a crew.
I can't even remember his name, he wasn't with us long enough, but he
just didn't like flying obviously.
Q. Was there any disappointment among your group when you were
sent to England rather than up North ?
When we were posted from Nhill to Sale, we weren't too
happy because Sale had a very bad name in those days. It was something to do with the aircraft
obviously, although I have read somewhere along the line that it was something
minor. Why it wasn't fixed I don't know,
but there was this minor hiccup with the aircraft and a lot of them
pranged. When we found that we were on
a draft for England - the three of us - we thought it was terrific. Sale was known as death valley and no-one
was keen to go there - only because of the aircraft.
Q. How was the organisation once you got to England ?
The organisation from the RAAF was very good. The English, RAF types looked at it
completely differently from the Australians.
We had a problem at Radio School atYatesbury. At one stage there were two hundred - two or
three, but quite a lot - Australian wireless operators down there and we were
all senior NCOs. It was a strict RAF
training station and the majority of people there were trainees - LACs and they
were treated - I won't say harsely, but they had to toe the line to the Nth
degree. When they got this influx of
Australians, they couldn't handle them.
At one stage they gave us.... a mess of our own, which was fair
enough. The food in England at that
time wasn't particularly good - it was basic - but the food they gave us in
this mess, you could hardly eat . So it
came to a head one day and a warrant
officer, one of our blokes, said, "Well, that's it. If this stuff they dish up today is... we just won't eat it." So we walked up to the servery - oh dear, it
did cause trouble. He was first in line
and he said, " You don't expect me to eat that? " "Well, if you don't eat that, you
don't eat anything." The warrant
officer made him stand up and take notice of what he was saying. So it went up the line from the sergeant in
charge to the Orderley NCO of the day to the Orderly Officer and in the end the
CO came down. Out of it all, things did
improve, but it should never have got to that situation. From that moment on, there was a definite
coolish atmosphere between the Australians and the RAF. In the end they didn't sent people in such
great numbers down there again. I think
they were glad to see us go as a matter of fact. Young and all as we were, by the time we
got to that stage we'd learnt a lot and we knew what was what. You can't stand over fellows, who looked at
things differently to start with. They
just didn't understand the Australian point of view at that time. Whether they did later on I don't know. But they wanted to dictate terms which were
not acceptable and the food, or rather the lack of it brought it to a head. Overall there were no great problems. We had no problems at any of the training
units we went to after that. The people
in charge and everybody seemed to get on alright. I mean everybody was in the same boat, that
was the idea of it.
Q. What about the people in charge on the squadron. ?
They were good people and they knew what they were
about. If you had a problem, you went
and talked to them about it and they listened to you, which was good. Squadron life was more relaxed. I suppose I could say that because you were
dealing in death and because you didn't know whether you're going to be alive
the next day or not, things were looked
at completely differently. We had a
situation that arose about an hour before the crews were going out to the aircraft. They had 1000 lb bombs with screw in glass
noses - these were all loaded. The
usual procedure was that the bombaimer had to test the load just to make sure
things were fine and there were no problems.
One of these things fell off just before the aircrew got there and it
blew up - with disastrous results of course.
(Break in tape - talking
about the Germans) .............They
couldn't care less what happened. They
weren't going to give in. When the
writing was on the wall, it could have been fixed, 9 or 12 months before it
finished. When you come to think of it
that the German generals themselves could see what was going on and they wanted
to throw in the towel and then all those thousands and thousands of people who
were killed later on....its cynical really isn't it ?
I heard the story of the American Fortress, it had taken
a hell of a belting and was staggering
home, in daylight of course. Along
loomed a German fighter and flew up beside the cockpit of the Fortress and
waved him on wishing him luck. That
story came out because the two pilots flying these aircraft met later on.
Q. Did
you think of staying on after the war.
No. I might have
if I'd managed to get that extension to Japan, but as I said earlier, I missed
the boat. I did go back into the active
reserve and was allocated back to Ballarat where there was a radio school.
Q Where were you based in England ?
At a place called East Kirkby, not far inland in the
East -
not far from Skegness, in Leicestershire. We used to head for London on leave, but not
as a crew because the English members would go home. I went home with the rear gunner a few times
and they used to look after me very well.
We did a trip back there four years ago and he was the only bloke I
could catch up with. The mid-upper was
in a veterans' home in Canada, Vancouver - he's stone deaf. My son Mark visited him for me on one
occasion - his family migrated to Canada after the war. The rear gunner is in business, now retired,
and he's still going. The bombaimer
went to Canada and he died. Harry lives
in Perth but the navigator and engineer- I went through all the avenues
possible to try to locate them when we made this trip, but they'd disappeared -
don't know what happened to them.
We had an experience when we were on extended leave after
the war and they were looking for something to keep us out of mischief. A lot of us got part time jobs as film
extras. They were filming Caesar and Cleopatra with Claude Raines and
Olivier DeHavilland. We used to trundle
out to Denham studios, south of London, I think, four days a week. We were getting as much in those four days as
we were with our service pay. So for
four days we put up with the hard stuff, but the other three were pretty good
living I tell you. Most of us were
Roman soldiers, but this particular day they decided to change us around to be
Egyptians. So the battle scene took
place and the Romans were supposed to win, but it didn't go that way as it got
a bit willing and the Egyptians, who were all Australians, won the battle. We all got the sack, so that was the end of
that. Some of the fellows got jobs as
storemen and some didn't last long at that because it was too much like hard
work. A few of them got work in the
breweries and they rather liked that.
Q Did you get used to drinking the English beer ?
Only the bottled beer.
You couldn't drink their... at that stage the stuff they poured out over
the counter was horrible, most of it.
Some of the hotels we used to frequent in London, especially one, the
Three Compasses was not far from Kodak
House. The Australians educated this
publican and the beer was always cold there.
I checked when I when over and that pub is still there.
Last Amended: 13/8/96
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