Patrick Hogan
Memories of being young in the 1940s

Swimming

Within reach of the village there were three options for us. The River Tame about two miles to the east,  the “Cut” (canal) which half-circled the village on the eastern and northern sides and finally Rakemore Brook which crossed the Old Burton Road about 500 yards northeast of the railway bridge after the Swan Inn.

Ponds for animal drinking water often contained leeches so they were not favoured.  The River Tame was awkward as it had some steep banks and it was a bit far away.  The “Cut”, about four feet deep, was used quite a lot for swimming until the increase in canal boats carrying coal and industrial fuels for the war made canal water too dirty and oily to swim in.

Rakemore Brook was the answer, but it had a drawback in that it was only about 3 inches deep for most of the year – however, a solution was found.
Some farmers dammed the flow where it passed through their fields to get a better depth for their animals to cool off in.  Some of us, wandering over the fields as we did, found the dams and remembered them for future years.  Fresh stream water up to two or three feet deep was very acceptable to us and most of us worked with cows and had no fear of the lumbering beasts.

As the weather grew warmer in late Spring we would wait for news that Rakemore Brook had been dammed again and where.  Off we would run on a bee-line to the spot and check out the dam and the depth. Happy with both, we would strip off, leave our clothes on a bush for safety and jump naked into the fresh water – which was still running, for no dam totally stopped the flow.  

Cows quickly got used to us and since we made sure that we stayed upstream of them, we co-existed easily as neighbours.  In fact cows were an advantage to have around, as bluebottles and horseflies stayed with them and didn’t bother us so much.

It was gorgeous, as for hours we dived, swam and splashed each other and swung from overhanging branches to drop into the water. With practice, a cupped right hand, banged forward hard on top of the water can direct a spurt 30 feet through the air to hit someone in the ear – he would return the compliment of course, and so the hours would pass.  Late Spring gave us the chance to look for raw coots eggs in the bushes by the stream.  In August, blackberries were everywhere but picking them without clothes on is a fine exercise in cautious moving!   By September we could munch fresh wild mushrooms for a snack.

No one ever brought a towel so if the sun was shining we would stretch out wet on the grass and got brown as well as dry – if it was cloudy we’d chase each other around the field till we dried off in the wind.  In the late afternoon we would trudge home for tea relaxed and pleasantly tired, with hair tousled and unkempt from natural drying.

Life was heaven.

Patrick Hogan  15 June 2009

Learning about the countryside in 1940’s Whittington

As young children in wartime Whittington, we were lucky and we knew it.  Growing up in our farming village, we had the opportunity to learn about life from a basic farming level upwards.  Apart from recently invented tools like tractors, multi-share ploughs and combine harvesters, farming had remained fairly traditional for the previous 100 years or so.   After the war, change came much faster so we knew we were lucky to be some of the last children to grow up in a traditional farming village in England.

Those born in the village started learning of the relationship between land and people as soon as they could walk. They were surrounded by it and it touched every part of their lives.  But I was born elsewhere so I had to learn even faster to catch the others up, though I was lucky in that when we moved to Whittington in 1939, I was just seven years old and thus, according to the Jesuits, at the most receptive age.  Most of what I saw and learned at that stage was remembered well and since I liked it all so much, it went deep.

Children in Whittington were not dreamy-eyed or living in an Enid Blyton fantasy world but were young realists in a practical farming village, learning about life in the country and wanting to be good at it like their parents.  The village was virtually our whole world since we seldom left it in the War.  Since it was all we had, we wanted to know everything about it.

On coming from a south of England suburb into the 1930’s Whittington village, I was surrounded by an altogether new and exciting world and thereafter, all five senses worked flat out.  Senses working together provide a stronger experience, as I found out first when I went to Mr Tom Windridge’s smithy.  I stayed there for a long time with my sister, Desiree, watching from first to last as a great Shire horse was fitted with new shoes.  The smell of the sweating animal within the confines of the smithy was exciting enough, but as each red-hot shoe was bedded on to a newly pared hoof, a pungent smoke cloud which could be seen, smelled and tasted all at the same time, hissed and billowed out from underneath the horse.  The smoke didn’t last long as the red-hot shoe was quickly taken off again and doused in cold water before being finally nailed on to the hoof, but the explosive moment when it was hot-bedded, imprinted itself indelibly upon my memory: all children fortunate enough to grow up in the countryside should witness hot shoeing for themselves - then they will know exactly what I mean and they will remember the experience forever, as I have.

It soon became clear that in the country, the sense of touch was more important than it had been living in a town since we were closer to nature here. The way things felt to the touch often helped to understand their nature better.  The bark of each type of tree was different, as were the leaves. Feeling with the hands, smelling and tasting helped us understand things better – though I’m sure the Health and Safety police will seek me out for saying such a dangerous thing!  (I wonder if this is why babies want to put everything into their mouths, even when they are not hungry – I’m joking please !)

Conifers
Most conifers felt rough to the touch and the bark was widely fissured. Pieces of bark would sometimes fall off when touched. Conifers were not easy to climb, needles got up noses and down shirts. We felt most conifers to be a bit foreign and un-English with the one exception of the Scots Pine, which is fine tree which once covered all Britain. 

Yew trees were interesting and very poisonous. These ancient, brooding, mysterious trees are now found mostly in churchyards - like the one on the south side of St Giles.  Village children were regularly warned off the Yew by their parents fearful that they might eat the berries or leaves. The red part of the berries in fact does no harm but the black seeds inside are deadly. Leaves and berries have killed both animals and humans when eaten. Even the bark and the sawdust is poisonous.  We had a Yew tree in the Hawthorns until it was chopped down to avoid the danger to my two tiny nieces should they eat the seeds.  Yew was sometimes unclimbable as the thick lower branches grew too close together to get through and there was too much dead brushwood inside.  In later years we used Yew to make bows to play Robin Hood.

Holly bark felt smooth but powdery to the touch. It was painful to climb up a Holly tree through the prickly leaves and hard branches. On reaching the earth again, our hands and knees would be stained a dirty green-black colour from the branches and needed much hard scrubbing.

Deciduous trees
Oak bark was rough and fissured with the tree strong and reliable, taking hundreds of years to mature. Timber taken from an oak was hard, straight and beautiful, lasting for many centuries if a death-watch beetle didn’t get in. The oak tree is prized in every country where it grows and many countries claim the oak as their “National tree” - as indeed, we do ourselves.  A great oak is easy and reliable to climb and seldom so thickly leaved that a good view from the top is spoiled. On the top of Cappers Hill stood two large oak trees, one each side of the road. The one on the north side was my favourite climb, giving a wonderful panoramic view over the village and surrounding countryside. 

The hybrid English Elm is tall and stately (if any still exist after the “Dutch Elms” disease), but the wood is brittle and not to be trusted. The bark is rough to the touch but feels somewhat edgy. Even large branches are brittle and can break off under their own weight without warning.  It is best not to climb one - or to loiter underneath.  Its country nickname is “Widow-Maker” and with good reason. We gave the English Elm a wide berth.

The Beech is a gracious, stately tree and its smooth bark even feels a bit metallic and is grey in colour.  It is difficult to climb as the lower trunk is usually without branches. In a Beech copse there are no bushes or plants on the ground as sunlight cannot penetrate the rich leaf canopy in summer. Beech gives a good crop of little nuts in Autumn. Each October another thick carpet of soft leaves falls to the ground to cover those of previous years, leaving the trees naked and starkly beautiful.

The respected Hawthorn tree was the preferred tree planted as a hedge since it can be made stock-proof. It is a challenge to climb. No matter how we tried to avoid them, we always got punctured by the hard sharp thorns. We pulled them out afterwards trying to get all the bits out too by sucking at the holes. A puncture might still go bad though – I got a poisoned hand this way in the War. It was lanced by Nurse Darby. Tender young Hawthorn leaves (we  called them “Bread and Cheese”) could be eaten but not with any great enjoyment. The red pips in late summer likewise are mealy and best left for the birds.  In the war when metal needles for our Gramophone (ancient sort of CD player) were blunt and new ones were not available, we snipped off the hardest thorns, roasted them in the oven and used them to play one record each.

Walnut trees could be climbed but getting the nuts could be done from ground level with long poles. Beating walnut tree branches was recommended to increase later nut yields, but it seemed to us boys, to be a lot of work for little return and slightly unfair on a tree giving us its nuts for nothing anyway!

Chestnut trees, like the ones in Bit End Field, were prized for they gave plenty of good sweet nuts to be gathered from under the trees in Autumn for roasting over the fire during Christmas. The cross cut into the shell on each side before putting them on the fire was supposed to remind us that we were Christians but was really done so that roasting nuts didn’t explode in the fire!

Conker trees (Horse Chestnuts) were unreliable. They looked strong but the branches were sometimes weak and brittle. We left them unclimbed and from our favourite trees, growing near the Dog on Elford Road (Fisherwick Lane), we knocked down conkers each year with sticks thrown from below.

Fruit trees were usually not climbed at all as most fruit hung in the sunshine on the outside and the trees themselves were too short or weak to serve as a good lookout and had too few leaves to hide us, anyway.

As children growing up in the village we felt almost everything with our hands, animate and inanimate alike. This seemed to give us a more intimate knowledge.  Cautions about the dangerous ones were passed down to us from parents and older children so we had some knowledge to start with. All plants were touched and felt except the known poisonous ones. Some plants were smooth, some hairy, some prickly, some thorny, some weak, some strong, some creeping, some erect. Many plants (except known poisonous ones) were even tasted gingerly - to be rated bitter, sweet, juicy, or tasteless. Nobody got ill as far as I remember.  We ate the tender white inside stalks of various grasses which could be slowly pulled out. In this way we learned to know and enjoy that special, sweet grass taste that animals love. “Pig-nuts” like knobbly marbles under the grass were sweet and delicious. We looked for their curly foliage amongst the grass then ripped up the turf with eager fingers to get at the treasures beneath. Wiping the earth off, we popped them into our mouths and crunched them with our teeth to savour their sweet, juicy, nutty taste.

We learned and tasted field crops.  Swedes and mangolds were the heaviest and both could be eaten raw. Sugar beet was of course, sweetish. Potatoes could not be eaten raw but a little wood fire was easy to make; the taste of a fresh field potato well roasted in a wood fire puts modern TV Chefs recipes to shame.  Raw turnips, cabbage and cauliflower tasted best young and fresh. The ears of green and growing wheat and oats were sweet and delicious, especially in mid summer when the fattening grains were juicily soft and milky.   Rye and Barley had too much sharp, bristly hair to bother with.

Animals were touched very carefully. We learned the feel of horses, sheep, cows, pigs, sometimes even Sydney Baxter’s bull through the iron bars of the air hole into his stall from Back Lane. The massive shorthorn bull loved his ears being scratched and munched the clumps of fresh grass we shoved through the hole.   We christened him Ferdinand for fun.  I believe he gored Sydney Baxter to a tragic death in later years.

Every day our noses were filled with the scent of animals and we learned to recognise the special smell of each breed. As young children, we touched animals with respect, never poking them or causing distress. Our contact with them was that of one animal to another, slowly, quietly, gently and offering friendship.  An animal would either stand stock-still, enjoying the scratch and feel of our fingers, perhaps even shivering in pleasure, or push back and blow hot breath against our hands. If it didn’t want to be bothered it would just move away.  Most animals liked being scratched behind the ears, on their forehead, on the top of the head, behind their neck, high on the middle of their back and just above the tail.  Pigs just adored being scratched – anywhere.

Having learned about animals in this way, in later years when we started to help on farms we were able to control them better and get them to do what we needed.  The most difficult animals were pigs. Sheep were not easy either for they were skittish and a bit silly, but pigs were by nature rumbustious, uncontrolled beasts, totally food-mad. They had to be either driven or tempted with food to get them to do what we wanted.  One had to be very aware when working with pigs; it was well known that careless or unlucky pig workers had been killed and even eaten by pigs.   Poultry were just a crowd of silly birds, but again they could be controlled by using food as bait and by moving slowly, calmly and quietly.  Aware that most animals could be dangerous, we learned how to deal with them properly, respecting them, acting calmly and keeping our wits about us.  We were careful of our safety and theirs.  After all, animals were valuable, and being country children, we wanted to do things right.

As young children, the use of our senses in investigating our village world continued with walls, kerbs, brick buildings, gravestones, iron gates, wooden gates, etc.  If something was there, then it had to be examined for us to better understand what it was, what it could do and why.  We found that some woods were soft, some hard and had a grain which could tell us from which tree it came; stone walls could be assessed for age by noting how much lichen was on it.  In our district, stone walls were of quarried red or grey sandstone. We learned that bricks were man-made from clay and so they were related to stone.

All country things had their own properties which were learned and compared to others.  For instance, a wire barb was almost as sharp as a Hawthorn but harder and it didn’t break off.  However, a wire barb was shorter so it didn’t go so deeply into the flesh as hawthorn!  Something we learned very early, was, “Don’t mess about with glass”.  Wood which had been transformed into doors, windows, tools, carts, etc was liked for it was known to have lived, was more natural and therefore closer to us as living beings. However, living in a village not too far from the Black Country where most metalwork in the country was carried on, we also understood the interaction between metal and wood and which was best for what – and why!  Leather fascinated us.  Having daily contact with cows and knowing where hides came from, we breathed in the rich smell of the 8mm thick shiny, brown, tanned leather hides which blind Fred Owen hung up in his shed in the Croft.  We watched him use his razor sharp knife to cut round the templates of soles or heels that he held on to the hides when repairing shoes.  In those days almost all shoes were made of leather so Fred had plenty of work to do.

Day by day as children, we learned more about life, what things are, what they do, and how we fitted into the marvellous world of Whittington, when it was ours in the nineteen thirties and forties.  We grew up happy, confident, outdoor children, with a pretty good idea of what life was all about.  

Patrick Hogan   16 August 2009 (Revised March 2010)

Growing up without toys

Like almost every other child in Whittington, for six years in the War I was never given a toy.  There weren’t any and they weren’t thought important.  For grown-ups, life was hard, dangerous and often tragic and the war effort fully occupied their lives, so toys for children just didn’t come into the equation.  We children understood this well and not for one moment did any of us feel “deprived” or “hard done by”.
On the contrary, we were stimulated to make do or make our own and had much more fun as a result.

Old Dolls and the power of imagination  -  Any girls who already had dolls, even old dolls, treasured them and disregarded any imperfections like lost limbs or worn off faces, giving them probably more affection than they had when the doll was brand new.  Half-broken dolls could even be more versatile and certainly looked more realistic in roles of “hospital patients”, “rescued bomb victims” etc. A few bits of wood and sticks with grass or leaves for a roof could be transformed by fertile young imaginations into hotels, castles or tropical palaces, as required by the game.  Our girls were skilled Fairy Godmothers without needing a magic wand !

Robin Hood -  Boys learned to become craftsmen using branches from yew trees to make bows and ash branches for arrows in the tradition of Robin Hood.  If they really weren’t that good, imagination made up the leeway and the young bow maker would picture himself shooting three hundred yards to split another arrow in the target and win the Sheriff of Nottingham’s purse!

Catapults - It was quite different with catapults. The results were much more successful.  On the look out for raw materials, most boys could soon spot the best Y fork on a branch and judge the “pull” and reliability of a given length of rubber. The best constructors became able to marry the two to make a catapult so strong and accurate that it could shatter a bottle from 100 feet - and thus was potentially lethal.   And then a funny thing happened.  Surprised to find we had made weapons which could really hurt someone and sensing a possible tragedy, we decided to put them away in our bedrooms and not use them any more.  Because of this, to the best of my knowledge no one was badly hurt by a catapult in our village in the war.

But if the Germans had come ……………….

Conkers  -  The game of “Conkers” was much less dangerous.  Conker players came in two main types.  Firstly there were run of the mill, general players, happy to wait for the annual conker harvest, select what they hoped would be a winner, bore it through from top to bottom without splitting it, thread it through with thick string, put a strong knot at the bottom and then go looking for an opponent to play.  Girls, if they played at all, belonged exclusively to this group.  Secondly, however, there were those boys who had within them the “must win” urge so beloved of Americans and modern soccer fans.  These players studied the biology and the chemistry of the conker plus the mechanics of the sport, in pursuit of “top gun” status.  Neither group was interested in playing against a member of the other.

Both groups were bound by an unwritten code which said:

“The conker which breaks the other conker  - wins    -   BUT  ”

a.  The composition of a conker must not be changed by chemical means in
     order to make it indestructible.
b.  Artificial conkers may not be used..
c.  A player is allowed three tries (3 swings) only, before his opponent tries.
d. “Strings” (when two conker strings become entwined) counts as a draw.
e.  Striking an opponent with a conker or impeding an opponent, means
    disqualification with no appeal.
   
Within those rules everything else was permitted.  Many a conker was bored through carefully then hoarded for years to dry out to a hard amber-like consistency and become local Champion - until one day, worn down by battles, it crumbled in its turn, to the bitter anguish of its owner.  The Conker season lasted about a week or two then all was finished till the following year.

Dicky – Dicky – Shine your light!

In the Blackout, lights were mostly forbidden or at best severely dimmed.  However, after the German bomber raids grew less in 1942, a game was born that owed its very existence to the Blackout.  The game was called “Dicky - Dicky - Shine your light” and it became incredibly popular with both girls and boys of the 12-15 age group in the second half of the War.  It was a teensy bit illegal – a flash from even a tiny torch was not really allowed.
 
In the country of the blind, the one eyed man is King.  12 to 15 year old girls and boys in Whittington in the middle of the War had grown up in Blackout conditions and thus had “one eye” when it was dark.  Moving around the village in pitch blackness became second nature, a fun game which we revelled in.   Our knowledge of the village became tactile.  In darkness our hands learned the different feel of the tops and sides of all walls and fences, our ears remembered the changing sounds of pavements and roads under our feet and our noses breathed in the smell of the various bushes in gardens over the walls. We knew where we were if the wind blew hard or softly in a particular way at a crossroads or when we heard an unusual rustling of trees from one side or the other.  In our own particular areas of the village, even in the most impenetrable blackness, we always knew where we were. Our senses had sharpened.

And this is why we liked the game so much. It was our special skill which no-one else in the village quite had.  We were the only ones who could really do this and it was so much fun for us.  Gradually, the game evolved. 

You might ask “If you were so good, what did you need a torch for?”  All of us who played the game had the same sort of skill level in the dark and soon we could all actually run in darkness – still knowing where we were. Our sight and hearing became more acute than others in the village, but we still could not see another person standing a long way away in the blackness.  

And that was the essence of the game – to hunt someone you cannot see, in darkness.  The game had a hint of danger, uncertainty, and the thrill of a chase.  The last component which completed the attraction to us children of the Blackout was that  we considered that “Dicky – Dicky – Shine your light”  was our own test. When we played, we were testing ourselves against each other.

The Game is born  -  Exactly how it all began will never be known, but probably on some black evening where ten or so children were gathered in the darkness, somebody carrying a little pencil torch ran off chased by some others and then hid. 
After the chasers had passed the hider, he would have flicked the tiniest flash of his torch at them and whistled and run off again. The chasing game began.

The game evolved further by the Dicky being given a 30 second start – in pitch darkness remember - and on one particular evening, somebody shouted by chance “Dicky – Dicky – Shine your light”  and gave the game its name. A good “Dicky” would anticipate where the Hunt would go first and do a dogs leg to catch them out – but when the call came the “Dicky” was “honour bound” to flash towards the call. And so the chase went on round the village. It was superb fun in the darkness and there was a lot of running done.  The chase usually ended by the Hunters dividing into two to catch the Dicky in the middle but sometimes it went on so long that we called it a draw and met up together to talk excitedly about the places we had been. Girls like Rose Treadwell were some of the keenest players and could run silently like lightning.  If any adults thought of running after us in the darkness, they must have given up the idea, knowing they would be unlikely to get anywhere near us.  No one ever did, that we heard anyway, for we knew every twist and turn in the blackness.

It was generally conceded that our game did no harm, for we were neither rowdy nor bad mannered.  I was told by more than one adult that if they were outside the house when it started, they thoroughly enjoyed hearing us call out and tried to take part in the game by working out which way we were going from the calls they heard. They said it reminded them of the games they had played when they were young, only in daytime.  Our tiny torches flashed only for the briefest millisecond, so our War effort was not really compromised.

Nobody tried to ban “Dicky – Dicky – Shine your light”.  The good Sgt Woodward would not even admit that it existed at all - for had he done so, he would also have conceded that lights were being flashed at night in his village contravening the Blackout regulations – and that would never have done.  And so – everyone turned a blind eye so to speak!  We may have been “scamps” but I think that many people were happy that we had some spirit. It could not have hurt our cause that many of us helped out on farms and in other ways from time to time.  We loved the game and grew fit as fleas with all the exercise.

When the Blackout ended, the house and street lights came on again and “Dicky – Dicky – Shine your light ” died.  Some stalwarts tried to keep it going but the lights ruined it for most of us.  There remains just the memory of those wonderful nights in the War, running swiftly and silently round Whittington village in pitch darkness –  chasing a flash of light.

Patrick Hogan 7 March 2009

The OOC

The  idea of the O.O.C. came from inside the head of Roger Pearce stimulated by WW2, Biggles novels, the Battle of Britain, wartime newspaper reports, the Richmal Crompton “William” novels -  and a latent longing by some young British boys, aged from 9 to 13 years, to be  “doing something”  in the War.

The heroism of the young pilots of the RAF particularly in the Battle of Britain in July, August and September of 1940 had fired our imagination as hardly anything else could have done.

The idea of these devil-may-care boy pilots – really not so much older than us schoolboys - defending our island against the Nazi hordes and winning out against tremendous odds struck a chord in the heart of every young, hot-blooded British boy.
Children of that time were extremely patriotic. We loved our country dearly and accepted all of its faults as our own. Intensely proud of our nation’s history, we were nurtured by stories of the courageous acts of British soldiers and sailors in the past.
Going back in time through the terrible Great War to the Boer War, the Zulu Wars, the Indian Mutiny, Waterloo, Trafalgar, Blenheim, Clive of India, Wolfe of Quebec, Walter Raleigh, Francis Drake, the Spanish Armada, Agincourt, Crecy, Poitiers, Hereward the Wake and Boudicca, we had an unshakeable certainty that though we might not be the most efficient in our battles, courage, ingenuity and our supreme belief in ourselves and each other would triumph over all odds. A common saying was “We might lose a battle but we will win the war” and we believed this.

Even in the darkest days of 1940, at the time of Dunkirk, and later when Hong Kong and Singapore had been lost, I doubt if you could have found a handful of us in the whole country who were not sure that in the end, no matter what the cost, we would win the war.  It was incredibly comforting to know that if a person was British, then you could trust him implicitly to stand by you – as you would stand by him.

Little boys throughout the land looked to grown-ups to lead them through the dark days of the war, and trusted them. Not always to be right, not always to win, but just to keep going, keep fighting, keep trying – after any other nation would have given in.  We just could not conceive of capitulating to the Germans or anyone else for that matter - for we were British and we didn’t give in like other people.  When Churchill spoke of fighting “on the beaches, the landing grounds, the fields, the woods, the hills…..”  he spoke for every person in the land. We would have done too, for Britain was our country and no-one was going to take it off us. It is peculiar but despite our hatred of the cruelty of the Japanese in the war, the one thing that struck a chord with us was their refusal to give in and their preference for death rather than dishonour. Yes, I know that British soldiers did surrender, but we always put this down to extreme circumstances with the knowledge that they would try to escape and get back to us and take up the fight again.  We were utterly confident in each other. 

Knowing him, we boys were not surprised but very interested when Roger Pearce pulled out an aircraft recognition book one day in 1941 and passed it round so we could see the photographs, silhouettes and descriptions of British and German aircraft.  Animated discussions broke out as for the first time we could see exact and correct information about planes that until then we had only seen in newspapers or flying overhead.  Misconceptions had abounded about the size, speed, armament, range, engines etc of planes up until that moment – but now we had this information in print.  I think that Roger had not anticipated the enthusiasm which greeted what he showed us or the envy which possession of such marvellous books engendered.  Every one of us wanted one and Roger was hard put to it to keep hold of them for himself.   And so an idea came to us.

It was common in the war with the shortage of reading matter, for a boy to read a comic or an adventure book and then swap it for something he hadn’t read. Every boy had his own stock and any new ones were eagerly seized upon, firstly to read and then to swap.  But these aircraft recognition manuals were a revelation and of a different dimension completely and we wanted them – now and permanently!  The problem was that old ones just did not exist and they could only be obtained brand new.  But Roger knew where he could get them and the only problem was that we had to buy them.   We were all so keen that 4 boys went back to their houses determined to earn, beg or borrow about sixpence (2½ p) per week to give to Roger who had agreed to send off to get the little books for us.

A few weeks later the first consignment arrived and we sat around in Mr Pearce’s paper-shop with Roger, avidly reading what we had got, looking at the photographs and excitedly talking about all the various planes and what they could do.  We were now, so we thought, emulating RAF pilots – learning what our aircraft were all about, seeing pictures and imagining them in battle against the Germans. When we read in the newspapers that Wellingtons had been in action over Essen, we could picture them flying over Germany.  I can only speak for myself but somehow in my child’s mind I felt that I was beginning to take a tiny part in the war!

Gradually Roger, who was the eldest by a year or two (and much the biggest), pushed out the suggestion that we might form a sort of club to learn more about planes and even visit Fradley aerodrome to look over the fence at planes as they took off to go on bombing missions. As one, we enthusiastically agreed and Roger then asked us what we should call this new club.  There were many suggestions, some pompous, others fanciful and some completely over the top.  Eventually we calmed down and agreed on the prosaic name  “Our Own Club”.  The O.O.C. (for short) was born.

It was decided that we would have ranks like real RAF servicemen. Because he was the brains behind it and the eldest, Roger became “Wing Commander Roger Pearce”. Whether this was by vote or assumption I cannot remember, but he was the right man to have as our Wing Commander (soon to be Air Vice Marshall)  for he could get the books and photographs and he had a place for us to meet!  Us lesser mortals in the Club were accorded ranks which reflected our age, the older a boy was, the more senior the rank.  For my life, I cannot remember mine, but I do know that it wasn’t very high – I was only nine years old, after all.

Because we were so young and in the learning period of our lives, the information absorbed from these aircraft books burned deeply into our brains and stayed there.  Seventy years later I can still recite the length, wingspan, max speed and number of crew of some of the British, American and German warplanes of WW2 and a couple of the Italian, Japanese and Russian to boot – and name them instantly from a silhouette!

We had great times, riding off on our bicycles on simulated bombing missions, meeting for tests of our skill at remembering the details of all the various planes (with every time, visual silhouette recognition - sometimes even with one eye closed!)  In the end, I believe we knew more than most civilians about the aircraft which helped to bring victory in Europe on the 8th of May 1945.

Patrick Hogan, 13 June 2009

In the summer of 1943 the complete O.O.C. Squadron (aged 10 to 13) sat in the room commandeered in the Pearce’s workshops to hear the briefing for the next bombing raid.  Under the watchful eyes of Wing Commander (soon to be Air Vice-Marshal) Roger Pearce, VC, DSO, DFC and bar, we waited for details of the sortie. The air was tense as I studied the tired, strained faces of the other members of the Squadron who I had come to know so well in the long months we had flown together. The tall angled figure of Squadron Leader David Swift, DSO, alert and keen as ever, leaned nonchalantly against the wall, chewing on a piece of straw. Only the occasional twitch of his left eye betrayed the strain we were all feeling after last night’s difficult mission.  Stocky, pugnacious, Flight Lieutenant Pat Withers DFC, leaned forward in his chair in a typically aggressive pose.  Nothing would stop Pat from reaching the target!   His younger brother, Pilot Officer Gordon Withers, newly arrived at the Squadron and yet to get a decoration, looked eagerly towards the briefing rostrum.   (Don’t worry Gordon, your time will come my boy!).

“All right Hogan, lock the door and I’ll begin” rapped out the Wingco as he strode to the lectern and faced the Squadron.   “Gentlemen – tomorrow’s mission is the most difficult and dangerous we have yet undertaken.  Secrecy is of the utmost importance - if any of this gets out, none of us may get back here after the raid!   No-one, absolutely no-one, may discuss this briefing outside of these four walls. That’s an order! ”

He looked around fiercely and then smiled. “My God” I thought, ‘’the Wingco’s a cool customer, he’s got ice in his veins.‘’

The Wingco continued.  ‘’The Target is COMBERFORD and we’re going in via ELFORD.  Aircraft will carry maximum bomb load and ammunition. Since you’ve all been flying Lancasters for some time now, I need hardly remind you that the extra heavy TALLBOY bomb will cut your cruising speed by 15 knots so you’ll have to watch out for Flak and weave about a bit.  BUT DON’T GET OUT OF FORMATION !’’   he roared.

Subdued grins lightened the atmosphere of the briefing – the Wingco was a stickler for keeping his Squadrons in formation!  He turned to me.  “Is your aircraft serviceable yet, Hogan?’’ ‘’It’ll fly, Sir’’ I replied, “the seat’s a bit dicky, but I’ll manage’’ “Good Show.’’  The Wingco approved of keenness and self-sacrifice, “Just make sure you keep up with the others – OK?  Right gentlemen, that’s all. Take-off will be at twelve hundred hours.  I shall lead.  Set your watches. And Gentlemen - good luck to you all!“

Loftily with a majestic gait, Wing Commander (soon to be Air Vice-Marshal) Roger Pearce, VC, DSO, DFC and bar, swept out of the room.  Magnificent!

Thus inspired, David, Pat, Gordon and myself left too - and went home for tea.  The summer morning dawned fine and clear – not the best weather to hide us from enemy fighters – we will have to be careful. I checked my aircraft again.  It was my sister’s tall ‘’sit-up-and-beg’’ upright bicycle, black and heavy, but with a basket on the front handy for sandwiches.  Being only ten years old, I was not yet tall enough to sit on the high leather seat and pedal at the same time. It was one thing or the other. I had therefore developed some skill at pedalling in the standing position until I had reached enough speed to allow me to heave myself on to the seat for a while and free wheel. On slowing down again I would lever myself off the seat and pedal whilst standing till I was again bowling along at a good speed, etc. etc.

At first this method of locomotion in spurts on our expeditions tended to annoy the Wingco who refused point-blank to let me pass him when I was at speed but also became irked when I temporarily fell behind the Squadron.  Because of the Wingco’s ire and loud bellowing, my rest periods became shorter as did my pedalling periods.  I was thus bobbing up and down on the heavy bicycle like a jack-in-the-box, expending great energy.  However, I was a fit young lad and since it was for the War Effort and the greater glory of the Squadron, I persevered.  By the dint of much effort and practice, by the time of the great Comberford Raid I was able to keep station in the Squadron formation without too much trouble. Also, being now so fit, I could show a turn of speed on the ‘black beast’ that was as fast as anyone. I didn’t fall off the bike so much either, as my sense of balance had improved too.

Our five aircraft set off in an easterly direction, that is, up Fisherwick Lane towards Peel Farm. The Wingco was energetic in his marshalling of the Squadron, using his voice to control those aircraft deviating from his perception of a proper formation. And so we proceeded eastwards with shouts and admonitions advertising our presence before us and behind.  We were comforted by the knowledge that all this directing could not be heard by Luftwaffe fighter pilots since their BMW engines were themselves so noisy that they would drown all other sounds out.  At Peel Bridge we stopped either for a rest for us or to allow the Wingco to rest his voice.  I forget which, but suspect the latter.  Ready to proceed again, the Wingco found that Squadron Leader Swift had disappeared down the canal bank looking for coots eggs. Some little time and rather a lot of shouting was needed to get the Squadron back on to its flightpath, but eventually with a certain lack of grace this was done and off we went again on our bombing mission.

Hademore Crossing caused a further delay as rail traffic was high that day and not all aircraft could get though the obstacle at the same time, but again, with a certain amount of coercion, this task was achieved as well, and the Squadron was set fair for Elford.

Modern readers might be wondering how we coped with the other road traffic.  The answer is, of course, that we didn’t - there wasn’t any. All the way to Elford from the Dog Inn we neither passed nor were passed by any other vehicle.  Which was as well, considering the difficulties the Wingco was having with the Squadron from time to time - we needed all the road available!

Having crossed the River Tame and landed at Elford, we took a break near the church to check over our aircraft, eat our sandwiches and drink the water and pop we had brought.  St Peter’s Church at Elford is beautiful, serene and historic. Originally built in the 12th Century, but altered and restored on many occasions since, it contains effigies of great beauty and has an atmosphere of peace and tranquillity. Like all other churches in our country at that time, it was open daily for any person to visit whether there was a priest or verger there or not.  There was no-one there at the time and we were free to look it over how we wished.  In our young patriotism we felt for all the world like visiting pilots and were privileged to be able to put our names in the visitors book. Then we left for Comberford, knowing that if we had to, we too would give our lives for our country for it was beautiful, good and worth fighting for.

Leaving Elford, the little hamlet of Comberford lies about two and a half miles south and is also on the east bank of the River Tame, the river that separates Whittington from Elford and indeed we felt, from the East and from Germany. The River Tame is a pleasant river but for us that sunny afternoon in the war it felt a little like a miniature English Channel defending our village of Whittington from invasion. And standing in Comberford we felt ourselves to be on the wrong side of the water, cut off from our home village - and we wanted to go back.

So having got there, we turned the whole Squadron round and under the masterful leadership of our Wing Commander, flew our aircraft back towards Elford, over the Tame bridge and safely back home to Whittington. And then, tired out, satisfied and a little in awe at our great adventure, we bathed and went early and happily to bed.

Patrick Hogan  10 June 2009

And we did eventually go to Fradley Aerodrome  –  but it was in the Autumn after the war had finished and hundreds of now discarded warplanes stood abandoned all over the airfield.  It was silent, sad and poignant and we felt the waste of it all. 
We rode home on our bikes without saying a lot.  New peace-time lives began for us  - the now  “ex-members of the O.O.C.”

Patrick Hogan, 13 June 2009