The Airfields
Gravely
Oakington
Warboys
Wyton
TopOn the night of 18/19 August 1942, 118 Bomber Command aircraft attacked Flensberg, in northern Germany. In the lead were 31 bombers - Sterlings, Halifaxes, Lancasters and Wellingtons - from No. 7, 35, 83 and 156 squadrons of the Pathfinder Force. For the first time the target was to be marked by Pathfinders, for these were then just four squadrons to operate with the newly formed force. The airfields from which they had come were Oakington, Gravely, Wyton and Warboys.
The target marking was a dismal failure that night - to the delight the new force's many, and influential, enemies in high places in Bomber Command.
Undaunted, its redoubtable young
Australian commander, Group Captain (later Air Vice Marshal) Donald Bennett,
was to mould the PFF into a force that led the way in bringing Bomber Command
into the electronic age, and in developing target-marking techniques that
enabled the PFF to literally light the way for Bomber Command to achieve
the accuracy and concentration that had previously eluded it.
TopGravelyTop
This airfield was opened on March 1st, 1942 initially as a satellite to Tempsford whose role was Special Duties flying in support of the resistance movement in occupied Europe.
In August 1942, Gravely was transferred
to the newly formed Pathfinder Force. Its first PFF squadron was No. 35
flying Halifaxes, and the squadron took part in the first PFF operation
on the night of 18 - 19 August. Subsequently converting to Lancasters,
it remained at Gravely until the end, taking part in the last operation
by PFF heavy bombers on 25 April 1945.
35 was joined at Gravely by 692
squadron which was formed on 1st January 1944 flying Mosquitoes as a part
of the PFF Light Night striking force. It flew its last operation, against
Kiel, on 2 - 3 May 1945. It is testimony to the outstanding qualities of
the Mosquito that 692 flew on a total of 310 operations with the loss of
only 17 aircraft. Compare this with 35 squadrons’ experience on four engine
Heavies, of 468 operations for the loss of 126 aircraft.
The early morning fog that so often shrouded in the bomber bases of eastern England was a feared killer to crews exhausted after many hours combat flying and often in damaged aircraft. Lacking any of the radio and electronic aids taken for granted today, a method was devised to burn off the fog before it along the runway and this technique known as FIDO (Fog Investigation Dispersal Operation) was first tested at Gravely, and had its first operational use there on 19 November 1943.
Gravely was placed on a care and maintenance basis in August 1946, and closed in 1958.
OakingtonTop
Planned as part of the pre-war RAF
expansion scheme this airfield therefore had high standard, brick-built
permanent accommodation. It was opened on 1st July 1940, flying Blenheim
bombers. Oakington achieved the distinction of being the airfield to operate
the first of the new breed of four engine heavy bomber - the Stirling,
with the arrival of No. 7 squadrons on 29 October 1940. This squadron still
with its Stirlings was transferred to the PFF in August 1942, remaining
at Oakington. Converting to Lancasters in 1943 it remained with the PFF
to the end, flying on the last operation by PFF ‘heavies’ on 25 April 1945.
In addition to the four engine heavies, Oakington also hosted the Mosquito PFF aircraft, including from 1 April 1943 to 1 Jan 1944 the aircraft of the vital 1409 Meteorological Flight.
Oakington was to see many years of distinguished service with the RAF in the post-war years; first, with Transport Command and then the Flying Training Command, before being handed over to the army in March 1975.
WarboysTop
Completed in 1941, this airfield
first served as a satellite to Wyton. In August 1942 it became part of
the new PFF, with 156 squadron flying Wellingtons, taking part in the first
PFF operation. Converting to Lancasters, it flew its last operation from
Warboys on 1/2 March 1944. From then until the end of the war, Warboys
discharged a training role with the PFF, as that force's navigation and
training unit.
Post war, Warboys housed a unit
of the Bloodhound air defence missile system, from 1960 until the station's
closure in 1963.
WytonTop
An early product of the expansion scheme, Wyton was opened in July 1936, and is the only one of the original Pathfinder Force bases to be in service with the Royal Air Force to this day.
Wyton has a special niche in Bombers Command's history, as it was from here that the Command's - indeed the RAF's - first operation against Germany of the Second World War was flown on the day war was declared, Sunday 3rd September 1939. At 1200 hours on that day, a Blenheim of 139 squadron piloted by Flying Officer A. McPherson took off to carry out a reconnaissance of the German fleet at Wilhelmshaven, from which it safely returned.
With its relatively spacious facilities, Wyton was selected as the headquarters airfield for the new PFF. Operations from here were begun by 83 squadron flying Lancasters. In fact the RAF Museum's famous Lancaster 'S' Sugar, flew its first 79 operations with 83 Squadron from Wyton, as that squadrons ‘Q Queenie’.
Wyton also pioneered the entry of
the RAF into the electronic age, with the first 'Oboe' Mosquito operation
of the war being flown on 20/21 December 1942. Wyton lost its four engine
heavies in March 1944 when 83 Squadron left to join No. 5 Group, and it
became an exclusively Mosquito base, with aircraft from 128 and 163 squadrons
flying on the last operation of the war on 2 - 3 May 1944 against Kiel.
Top
Top
By the end of 1941, the Air staff was confronting a chilling truth. After two years of devoted courage and bloody sacrifice, Bomber Command remained as it had been in 1939, when as the "Official History" bluntly states
"[It] was not trained or equipped either to penetrate into enemy territory by day, or to find its target areas, let alone its targets, by night"
Between January and June 1941, 31,500 tons of bombs had been dropped by night on Germany in pursuit of the RAF's claim that Germany could be knocked out of the war by a strategic bombing campaign. A report in August 1941 by D. M. Butt of the War Cabinet secretariat gave an alarming picture, not of accuracy and concentration, but of bombs scattered broadcast over the German countryside. His analysis of aiming point photographs from 100 raids showed that of crews claiming to have hit the target, only 1/3 had in reality reached the target area. As the target area was a radius of five miles this gives a land area of 75 square miles. And only the most experience crews carried cameras in 1941!
Even Berlin could be missed: on
7/8 November 1941, 169 bombers attacked the City - and rendered a total
of 398 Berliners homeless.
1942 brought little improvement.
Between March and June bomber Command sought to wreck the heart of Germany's
armaments industry in a sustained campaign against Essen. Result: no real
damage to Krupps industrial complex - indeed over 90% of the attacking
aircraft dropped their bombs between five and 100 miles of Essen.
In sum, Bomber Command at night was mostly lost. Furthermore, the army and Navy were being presented with telling evidence to support their demands that resources of men and material should be diverted from wasteful heavy bomber production into anti-submarine operations and a tactical bombing campaign. At stake was not simply the survival of strategic bombing, but the continued existence of an independent Air Force.
Fortunately for Bomber Command’s future, in November 1941 Group Captain S.O. Bufton was appointed Deputy Director of Bombing Operations. Not only had he considerable first hand experience of bombing operations, but he knew well and listened to operational squadron and station commanders. From his experience and the views of operating aircrews, he concluded that what was needed was a specialist Target Finding Force (something that the Germans had pioneered with Kampfgruppe 100 in 1940). He therefore proposed that a force of 6 squadrons be established, containing crews of the finest navigational abilities selected from all squadrons of Bomber Command to act as Target Finders for the main force.
Bufton needed all his great courage and determination to see his ideas come to fruition, for his proposals were rejected out of hand in November 1941, and again in March 1942 by the then newly appointed C-in-C of Bomber Command, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris. Harris and his Group Commanders were of one mind in resisting anything that smacked of creating an elite force.
[There are very sound arguments from military history, Air Force tradition, and the impact on the morale of the existing Bomber Command squadrons, to support opposition to the idea of elite formations.]
They did not argue that nothing
needed to be done, but that it should be done by each group developing
its own expert squadrons, which had already begun. Events were, however,
on Bufton's side. Aware of the growing influence of the Army and Navy lobby
in political circles, the Air Staff under the CAS, Air Chief Marshal Sir
Charles Portal, recognised that bomber command must be seen to be taking
radical measures to deal with its crisis as a matter of urgency.
They turned to Bufton's proposal to provide the remedy. In June 1942 Portal
overruled Harris and his Group Commanders, and ordered the establishment
of the Target of Finding Force.
Once over-ruled, Harris did the new force the best possible turn by appointing Group Captain D. Bennett to its command. Bennett was an outstanding and gifted leader in a situation where the highest standards (he was himself a uniquely brilliant pilot and navigator) and a ruthless determination were required. Harris was not, however, completely cowed, he insisted that the new force be called Pathfinder Force, rather than Target Finding Force. Furthermore, Groups were instructed to send entire squadrons rather than the picked leaders that Bufton had envisaged. Bennett was to be equal to this; demanding excellence he was ruthless in weeding out any aircrew who failed to meet his exacting standards.
Though it was born in controversy
- and indeed was never to be loved by No. 5 Group - the force grew from
the small beginning of four squadrons in August 1942, to a mature force
as No. 8 Group, Bomber Command. By the wars end it operated
from 11 stations with 19 squadrons, 8 equipped with four engine Lancasters,
and 11 with Mosquitoes.
BibliographyTop
1. Harris, Sir Arthur T. “Dispatches
on War Operations, 23 Feb 1942 – 8 May 1945”. Frank Cass, 1995.
2. Moyes, Philip. “Bomber Squadrons
of the RAF and their aircraft”. Macdonald, 1964.
3. Musgrove, Gordan. “Pathfinder
Force”. Macdonald and James, 1976.
4. Richards, Dennis. “Portal
of Hungerford”. Heinemann, 1977.
5. Smith, Graham. “Cambridgeshire
Airfields in the Second World War”. Countryside Books, 1997.
6. Terraine, John. “The Right
of the Line”. Hodder and Stronghton, 1985