Pin-Feathers*
by Old Nyati
*Once in demand by Victorian miniaturists, the tiny pin-feather comes from the leading edge of a woodcock’s wing and only two such feathers occur on each bird (one on each wing). This month Old Nyati remembers an incident during WW2. Last month it was rats, sticklebacks and steam engines; but there was a war going on as well. Early one night I recall being awakened by a lot of conversation on my side of the farmhouse. It was my parents and older sister who were looking through a bedroom window where, in the far distance, the night sky and low cloud were illuminated with light and this was quite alarming as the “Blackout” dictated that no light must show outside under any circumstance whatsoever. Even a small light could be seen by an enemy bomber and give a clue as to navigation or the whereabouts of a target. We learned the next day that what we had seen was the city of Coventry on fire after an intensive night time bombing raid. London was being hit every night and one of my aunts was matron of a hospital in Beckenham and wrote to my mother quite often, but these letters from London during the Blitz were always censored by the Post Office, an official stamp showing that they had been opened. Any reference as to what was going on in London meant that they would not be delivered, and my aunt would, of course, have been in the worst of it. It was not long before our turn came, if only by default, as our farm was about twelve miles from Derby and the Rolls Royce engine factory, a prime target of course, but so far untouched. The night time raids on Coventry and other cities where terribly accurate because of a system developed by the Luftwaffe which was called Knickebein (Crooked Leg). It was a radio navigation system that involved narrow radio beams sent out from two widely separated locations. The two beams would intersect over a target city, marking it for bombing. An aircraft would follow the first and then drop its bomb load as it picked up the intercepting signal, all fiendishly successful and accurate as our cities found to their cost.* Luckily one of the bombers carrying this radio device crash landed on the English channel beach and despite being soaked in sea water gave our boffins a chance to find out
how this clever system worked. A few days after the Coventry raid a radio reconnaissance aircraft was able to locate these radio beams and work out how to jam one of them. I found out recently that this period of the Blitz was called the Battle of the Beams and our boffins codenamed their investigations “Headache” and the eventual solution “Aspirin”. So now back to our turn. One night soon after all this a stick of bombs fell across our fields only missing the village by a few hundred yards, killing several of our cows and making huge craters where they exploded - all except one. Next morning everyone stood round this small hole discussing what a puny bomb it was, eventually deciding to go back and have a cup of tea, only to be shocked by an almighty bang which shook all the houses and brought a hail of stones and debris down on the roofs. That small hole had in fact been made by a delayed-action time bomb and had now produced the biggest crater of all. What a lucky cup of tea that was! It was after this that for many weeks we all slept down in the farmhouse cellar for safety. But then, why bomb a few cows? Hardly a strategic target. During my recent research into Headache and Aspirin it occurred to me that perhaps those bombs were intended for Rolls-Royce twelve miles away; the factory never did get bombed. To my surprise a line projected along the line of craters passed over the RR factory and on to the area in France of the Knickebein transmitter. So was that aircraft a pathfinder to the target? Had the intercepting beam just been jammed? My imagination suggests it was, the dates do coincide. The cows paid the price and the cup of tea proved to be a salvation for us - you could call it fate I suppose.
The crash-landed Heinkel 111 bomber
It is interesting to note that the first wartime bomber to be shot down was in Scotland, a Heinkel 111, crash landed just NW of Glasgow and one of its engines was detached and taken to RR Derby for evaluation. There was a story of a dogfight over the docks near Edinburgh when another Heinkel 111 was shot down by a rather outdated Gloster Gladiator. The German pilot upon crashlanding and interrogation refused to confirm that it was a Gladiator and insisted HE could only have been shot down by a SPITFIRE - but there were none in the area at that time. *those of you interested in the full and fascinating story should go to http://www.vectorsite.net/ttwiz_07.html HIGH FLIGHT
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings; Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there, I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . . Up, up the long, delirious burning blue I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace Where never lark, or ever eagle flew — And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod The high untrespassed sanctity of space, Put out my hand, and touched the face of God. John Gillespie Magee Jr
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