Canadian TAIL-GUNNER: The MAN. His OFFICE!

FOR 3 YEARS. In WW II. In the RCAF.

He beat the odds.

MOST, didn't.

Now a free man…in a free world. A freedom he helped win for generations of Canadians to come after the war.

THEN, aboard Halifaxes and Lancs.

The average lifespan of a rear-gunner, or tail-gunner, was about 10 missions. Being generous here.

I talked to him about the Halifax heavy bomber vs. the Lancaster heavy bomber…you know, which did he like better?

Hands down the Mighty, Mighty Lanc.

Seems it boiled down to the shape of the Lanc's wings which meant the Lanc was highly manoeuvrable in tense situations, compared to the lumbering Hally.

And safer.

Caught in a Nazi spotlight?

No problem.

The captain of his Lanc would dip the Lanc's wings to a 90 degree angle (to the ground) and proceed to drop, slicing downwards through the air…for hundreds of feet…effectively losing the lifetaking spotlight.

And then complete the bombing run.

I was so immeshed in our conversation (which had gathered a small crowd), I forgot to ask our homegrown hero what his name was!

AND, I wasn't the only curious one! As I left, another guy appeared and was rifling questions at this guy like there was no tomorrow.

So…what do we know about him?

Our tail-gunner was assigned to Bomber Command, of the illustrious All-Canadian Group 6: RCAF 428 Squadron, Ghost Squadron. The "Ghost" moniker was earned through its many night bombing ops. And through the death and destruction which the Canadian squadron meted out to the Nazis, and to their incessant efforts at war production. The squadron badge depicted a skull in a shroud…a chilling death head.

Squadron 428 flew in night and tail-gunner was responsible for being on the lookout for any approaching enemy fighter-planes.

RCAF Lancaster bombers flew as solo aircraft, while American bombers flew in formation.

Therefore when the tail-gunner, rear-gunner, or "Tail-end Charlie" as they were interchangeably called, spotted an enemy night-fighter he radioed his captain who would then engage in radical flying maneuvers like a corkscrew roll, etc. to escape. When all else failed…the tail-gunner would cock his machine-guns and open fire on any pursuing enemy aircraft!

This gentle warrior comes out to CWH every year for Remembrance Day. To remember his fallen buddies.

Wouldn't be anywhere else.

What do we know about the 428 of the RCAF?

Hailfaxes of 428 Squadron, flying at 15,000 feet carried out the first highlevel bombing of Brest with mines!

In June 1944, the squadron struck their Handley-Page Halifaxes off charge… and were re-equipped with Canadian-built Mark X Lancasters…which were made in Malton.

After the war 428 was stationed in Yarmouth Nova Scotia, until the 5th of December when the squadron was disbanded.

RCAF 428 Squadron re-formed mid-June 1954 as a night-fighter squadron flying CF-100 Canucks and was scheduled to be the first Canadian squadron to receive, and put into operational status, the never-to-be Arrow.

In 1961, specifically May 31…the squadron was again disbanded, for a final time.

We Are the Dead…

(published on Flickr, November 11, 2007)

WE ARE the Dead…

…short days ago…

One of the dead, Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae, MD.

The man.

The life.

His ultimate sacrifice.

The poem as it appeared, anonymously, in Punch, December 08, 1915.

To fill out the bottom corner of a page.

It was expected to be read and forgotten and disappear like most of Punch’s stuff…

Only it didn’t.

It “spoke” to so many… from every walk of life, all who had been touched by his words, and whose lives had already been, forever altered, by war.

So many…… never came back.

We must remember them. And thank them.

By our lives.

By the defense of our freedom and our ally’s freedom. Whenever that call comes.

Right now, Canadians are being called to support Afghanistan, in her quest to maintain her shaky democracy.

Already, seventy-one Canadians have given their lives for Afghanistan… for her to remain free.

Rest in peace, heroes… past and present.

more about… LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOHN McCRAE, MD
Physician, surgeon, medical author, sketch artist, WW I soldier and unlikely poet.

Even more unlikely– a Canadian.

John was not a peacekeeper.

John is forever remembered NOT for the lives he saved as a doctor and field surgeon, nor for the battles he fought as a Second Boer War and WW I soldier, BUT FOR his reflections on war and the necessity of maintaining our religious and cultural freedom, in keeping that faith, especially with those who have given their ultimate sacrifice to that very end.

Colonel John McCrae, from a WW I trench wrote, “In Flanders Fields” on a scrap of paper, upon the back of Colonel Cosgrave during a “recess” from the bombings. The inspiration for his sombre and reflective poem came after John attended the burial of a friend, and former student of his, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer.

John didn't like the poem and tossed it out. Another officer however "rescued" it and submitted it to Punch for publication. "In Flanders Fields" was published anonymously, on December 8th in 1915, about halfway through the war. McCrae's poem became famous “instantly”, and thus his identity was soon discovered.

"Demanding the highest possible standards of service to sick and wounded soldiers, McCrae insisted on living in a tent like his comrades at the front and had to be ordered to the heated huts when the winter badly affected his health. He felt the war intensely, watching its changes reflected daily in the barometer of the many casualties reaching the hospital."

SADLY John, a life-long asthma sufferer, would succumb to pneumonia while in command of No3 Canadian General Hospital at Boulogne, France only ten months before World War I would end on November 11, 1918.

"He would have broken faith had he lived while so many died."

John was happy with the poem’s success if, "the poem enabled men to see where their duty lay."

C.L.C. Allinson reported that McCrae "most unmilitarily told [me] what he thought of being transferred to the medicals and being pulled away from his "beloved" [artillery] guns. His last words to me were:

'Allinson, all the damn doctors in the world will not win this bloody war: what we need is more and more fighting men.'"

© John F. Prescott
© 2000 University of Toronto/Université Laval
© 2007 Special Projects IR
© 2007 Paul Cardin