Aircrew: The Story of the Men Who Flew the Bombers (32 page)

An item appeared in the August, 1975 issue of an American publication known as the
Veterans of Foreign Wars
. It read as follows:

A former German fighter pilot, now in Munich, Heinz Hanke, is seeking a former American bomber pilot who bailed out over the Baltic Sea on 20 February, 1944, and was taken to Odense, on the Danish Island of Fyn, for interrogation.

The American was known to the German only as Lieutenant ‘Mark’ from Minneapolis. On the back of his jacket were the words, ‘Miss Behavin’ and below that, pictures of 18 bombs. Before he was taken to a prison camp in Oberursel, the two men had a Danish beer and parted wishing each other good luck.

If anyone has information about the American, please contact …

Orlin, although he regularly received the VFW magazine, missed the notice from Hanke. However, it was brought to his attention by an old friend. Letters were then exchanged and six months later Orlin flew to Munich to meet Hanke.

Hanke gave the American a well decorated walking stick that represented his combat history. It includes nine front view silhouettes of his aerial victories. Orlin also received a Luftwaffe flying jacket to replace the one taken from him.

Orlin presented Hanke with a shield-like plaque with mementoes of his career – hat insignia, wings and other emblems. It is inscribed:

February 1944 – February 1976. To Heinz Hanke. Once a Foe, now a Friend.

Pierre Clostermann, DSO, DFC, a fighter pilot, shall have the last word on those aircrew who flew in heavy bombers in World War Two:

Here and there in the Fortress formations there were gaps. From close to you could see machines with one, sometimes two, stationary engines and feathered propellers. Others had lacerated tail-planes, gaping holes in the fuselages, wings tarnished by fire or glistening with black oil oozing from gutted engines.

Behind the formation were the stragglers, making for the coast, for the haven of refuge of an advanced air base on the other side of the Channel, flying only by a sublime effort of will. You could imagine the blood pouring over the heaps of empty cartridges, the pilot nursing his remaining engines and anxiously eyeing the long white trail of petrol escaping from his riddled tanks. These isolated Fortresses were the Focke-Wulf’s favourite prey. Therefore the squadrons detached two or three pairs of Spitfires, charged with bringing each one back safe: an exhausting task as these damaged Fortresses often dragged along on a third of their total power, stretching the endurance of their escort to the limit.

On this occasion Ken sent Carpenter and me to escort a Liberator which was only in the air by a miracle. Its No 3 engine had completely come out of its housing and hung on the leading edge, a mass of lifeless ironmongery. The No 1 engine was on fire, the flames slowly eating into the wing and the smoke escaping through the aluminium plates of the upper surface, buckled by the heat. Through the tears in the fuselage the survivors were throwing overboard all their superfluous equipment – machine guns, ammunition belts, radio, armour plates – to lighten their machine, which was slowly losing height.

To crown it all, there was a burst in the hydraulic system,
freeing one of the wheels of the undercart which hung down and increased the drag still further.

Throttled back to only 1,800 revs, and flying at 200 mph, we had to zig-zag to keep level with him. We had been hunched up in our uncomfortable cockpits for two hours already, and we were still over France, twelve miles behind the main formation. Then Focke-Wulfs began to prowl around us, at a respectful distance, as if suspecting a trap. Anxiously Carp and I kept an eye on them.

Suddenly they attacked, in pairs. Short of juice as we were, all we could do was to face each attack by a very tight 180 degree turn, fire a short burst in the approximate direction of the Hun, and immediately resume our position by another quick 180 degrees. This performance was repeated a dozen times but we succeeded in making the Focke-Wulf s keep their distance. They eventually tired of it – or so we thought.

Over Dieppe the fighters gave way to the flak. We were flying at about 10,000 feet. The German light flak opened fire with unbelievable ferocity. An absolute pyramid of black puffs charged with lightning appeared in a fraction of a second. Violently shaken by several well-aimed shells, Carp and I separated and gained height as fast as we could with our meagre reserves of petrol. The poor Liberator, incapable of taking any sort of violent evasive action, was quickly bracketed. Just as we thought it was out of range there was an explosion and the big bomber, cut in half, suddenly disappeared in a sheet of flame. Only three parachutes opened out. The blazing aluminium coffin crashed a few hundred yards from the cliffs in a shower of spray, dragging down the remaining members of the crew.