Rescuing The Rescuers
(Source: Air Sea Rescue by Alan Rowe, ISBN 0-7509-0911-0)
Rescue of USAAF personnel by 69th RML Flotilla (HMS Beehive, Felixstowe)
5th Oct 1944, Mustang 505 Squadron
Position 128 degrees (T) Orfordness 11 miles.
Pilot picked up by trawler, Walrus crew by RML 547
RML547 'Dunkers' Club' List of members
5th Oct 1944, Walrus 278 Sqn FAA (Fleet Air Arm)
W/O F J Bedford FAA,
L/A B Westbrook
Excerpt from rescue account by the crew of RML 547
"We were on our way out to our patrol position when we were vectored to a ditching. We had been having engine trouble, but our motor mechanic, P.O. Mason, quickly got us going again, and we were soon heading at full revs along the bearing we had been given.
"Have you heard the buzz?" said Boswell to his assistant gunner, Evans, a pale and rather undernourished cockney, who came in for a bit of mickey taking from his mates.
"Naow, what?" was the anxious reply.
"There's a Walrus ahead!"
"Gain" growled Evans, "'What you on about?" Jimmy just told us. "There's been three of them fighters already all saying the same thing. In fact, we now seemed to be over-supplied with support aircraft." We had had three separate message that just ahead of us a Walrus was going down to pick up a fighter pilot from a one-man dinghy. A naval trawler was said to be standing by, but obviously experience had shown that there could be problems which only we would be able to deal with. So we carried on, very soon spotting the trawler - the George Adgell - with the Walrus close by.
"Walrus reports the airman is now in the trawler," called Clem Woodhead, on VHF watch in the wheelhouse. "Stand clear, about to take off."
"You hope," murmured someone behind me, as the little plane taxied into the wind and began its run. We remained at a distance, watching anxiously.
An easterly wind had gradually increased in strength since the rescue had taken place and it was blowing the spray off the white horses which fringed the short, choppy waves into which the Walrus had to fly, working up to maximum speed in order to take off. As it scudded across the wave-crests, it started to bounce more and more heavily, sending up sheets of spray around its wings, as it dug ever deeper into the surface at every bounce. The buffeting was more than its frame could endure. Suddenly one wing dipped the other rose in the air and it keeled over and slewed round to port.
"It dipped its port wing" I exclaimed, "It looks as if the float's ripped
This was indeed what had happened. Fortunately, however, before the plane could capsize, the pilot had throttled back his engine and brought it to a stop, listing badly, with its lower port wing under the water looking like a wounded bird.
"Full ahead," said Andy. "We'll close her. They'll not be able to take off now."
"Wilson! Ainsworth! Stand by with heaving lines. Boswell! Evans! Get Fenders."
I ordered. "Goodwin, bring a dinghy up to the bow."
"We'll come alongside her bow," said Andy, seeing the pilot climb out of the for'ard cockpit as we approached from the port side of the aircraft. "Slow ahead, starboard ten... midships... steady as she goes. Stop both. Slow astern port. Stop engines."
Carefully, he placed our bow just ahead of the plane's bow and brought it under our lee. There was no need of heaving lines or even fenders. The pilot, taking advantage of a rising wave, was able to grab the guardrail and get a foot on to the ship's sidestrake, amidships. We were then able to help him over the rail without too much difficulty.
The Walrus was floundering badly, however, and taking on a steeper list, which threatened the life of the observer, who had clambered out on to the starboard wing as the fuselage filled with seawater and started to sink by the stern. His situation looked extremely precarious. He was half-kneeling on the upper wing, clinging to the edge to avoid slipping down the increasing incline.
Using the engines to swing the stern clear and then come swiftly around to starboard. Andy thrust the bow of 547 neatly up against the wing tip, which was just high enough to form a kind of gang-plank on to the point of our bow.
It was so impressive that I can still picture the airman rising to his feet and simply stepping aboard: there was only a very low rail on the fo'c'stle so as not to obstruct the field of fire from the pom-pom. It was only just in time, however, for as we pulled astern to clear the wreck, the wing rose high in the air and the aircraft gave a sudden lurch and began to sink. Within a few minutes it had disappeared beneath the waves."
Bibliography
The Messerschmitt Combat Diary Me.262 By John Foreman & S.E.
Harvey
USAAF Fighter Stories By Ian McLaclan
Another Kind of Courage by Norman Franks
History of the 339th Fighter Group Lion in the Sky by Jerry Scutts
Aces and Wingmen II by Danny Morris
Airpower Magazine, January 1944
Warbirds Magazine, August 1944
Warbirds Magazine, October 1944
Air Sea Rescue, By Alan Rowe