Description
Object description
British officer served as pilot with 78 Sqdn RAF in GB, 1943; shot down over Holland, 22/Jun/1943, and returned to GB via the Comet escape line, 6-10/1943
Content description
REEL 1: Recollections of period in Holland, Belgium, France and Spain, 6/1943-10/1943: story of bailing out over Holland while flying as co-pilot on first operation, 22/Jun/1943; landed in potato field; casualties in crew; description of evasion training; story of being given clogs and civilian clothes by Dutch farmer; travelled alone for five days; attitude to being captured; story of using phrase cards to request food and water at café in village of Berlicum; story of meeting contact from Dutch Resistance; description of living conditions at safe house in Rosmalen; story of German patrol marching past cafe; used bicycles without tyres; disguised as Dutch farmer; further comments on first five days alone; story of hiding in wood near Tilburg with students and Jewish refugees; story of jumping off tram to avoid German soldiers checking papers; problem of leaving RAF identity discs in GB; story of Dutch Resistance members taking vote on claim to be RAF pilot; taken to Brussels to make contact with Comet line; story of meeting Micheline Dumon ('Michou') at safe house; taken to safe house in Paris; question of never writing down names of agents; obtained goods from the black market; story of watching German propaganda film in cinema; description of train journey from Paris to Bordeaux; issued with false papers for Parisian architect; ability to speak French; continued journey to station at Dachs; given bicycles and met with guide 'Franco'; story of being stopped by gendarme while cycling through village and taken to police station; problem of collaborators; description of 14 hour journey from St Jean-de-Luz across Pyrenees, 10/1943; taken to British Consul at San Sebastian, Spain and driven to British Embassy in Madrid; story of being smuggled in ship from Seville to Gibraltar; flown back to RAF Lyneham, GB, on Dakota; post-war reunions; attitude to politics; weather conditions during journey; question of Spanish handing over escapees to Germans; returned to 78 Sqdn RAF and completed 39 missions; awarded DFC.