ONLY ONE WOULD SURVIVE
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ONLY
ONE WOULD SURVIVE One
can't foresee the fortune of war. In World War Two, Royal Air
Force Bomber Command carried out more than 300 000 sorties.
125 000 airmen served in this Command. 55 500 of them didn't
have the luck to taste the final victory. In may 1944, 12 British
bombers were lost in a few minutes, during a raid against Lille-Fives.
In every plane, 7 crewmembers. Out of these 84 men, only one
survived. This is the story of Donald Philip Smeed SMITH, the
only survivor. In
the weeks before the D-Day landing in Normandy, the allies bomb
every communication means that the Germans could use to send
reinforcements against the bridge-head. In April 1944, Lille-Délivrance
Marshalling Yards are the target of a raid particularly expensive
in French human lives. (see AUTREFOIS n° 33). It's with the
same aim that Lille-Fives Locomotive repair shops (target Z183B)
are designed to the attention of No 5 Group Bomber Command,
on may 10 1944, for a simultaneous attack of 4 rail road targets. That
night, No 3 Group drops 534 tons of bombs on Courtrai (Belgium)
marshalling yards, No 6 Group (Canadian) drops 425 tons of explosives
over Gand (Belgium) marshalling yards and No 4 Group drops 535
tons of bombs on Lens (France) marshalling yards. No 8 (PFF)
Group ensures the Path Finder job for these 3 raids. No
5 Group carries out the marking job for himself. 85 Lancaster
take off around 2200 hours to bomb the target at "zero"
hour, 2330 hour. 2 abort the mission for mechanical trouble.
4 Mosquitoes of 627 Squadron are in charge of the marking with
smoke bombs. The first ones are dropped dead on time, 150 meters
from the Aiming Point, but are soon obscured by the smoke of
the first explosions. The Master Bomber then orders by radio
to wait in stack, south of the target, while a new marking is
done. After
the necessary delay (records give the number of 20 minutes),
the raid starts again. 417 tons of bombs rain on the Lille-Fives
repair shops. FLAK
is moderate, apart from an intense fire at 10,000 ft, while
the Lancaster fly between 7 et 11,000 ft. Several crews also
report having seen enemy fighters, single-engine and twin-engine.
Around 2340 hours, in the waiting circuit, 2 Lancasters collide
in mid air, and at about quarter to midnight, other English
bombers come down in flames near the target. In barely a few
minutes, 10 four-engine crash in the general area of Lille,
et 2 more will crash in Belgium on the return leg. One
bomber is captained by Flight Lieutenant J.B. SMITH D.F.C.,
M.i.D., a very experienced New-Zealander, aged 27. He has already
carried out 38 operations. Unfortunately, his plane crashes
inside the Lille-Lesquin Luftwaffe airfield limits. The others
explode in the sky and come down on the territory of Lezennes,
Hellemmes, Forest-sur-Marque, and Annappes, where a bomber digs
a giant crater, near the Messian farm. The unique presence of
Australian gunner, Flight
Sergeant B.F. CODY, in Annappes Churchyard, enables
us to think this particular bomber could be Avro Lancaster B
Mk III EE143 PO-J belonging to 467 Sqn, a Royal Australian Air
Force (R.A.A.F.) Squadron. And
justly, the Australian units will suffer the biggest casualties
of this night : Out of the 17 crews dispatched, 467 Sqn lost
3, and 463 Sqn, which shares the same airfield, Waddington,
also lost 3 crews out of 14. IX, 50 and 97 Sqn each lost 2 crews.
More
than the death of 83 men, one must point that 6 of them, F/L
G. BELL, D.F.C., F/S W.A. SLADE R.A.A.F. and Sergeants H.W.
MATTHEWS, D.A. CATO, J.W. PARKER and H.M. KENT have no known
grave, and are commemorated on the Runnymede memorial, in Surrey. At
2157 hours on May 10 1944, Avro Lancaster B Mk III serial number
LM475, coded PO-B, from 467 (R.A.A.F.) Sqn, takes off from Waddington.
Her pilot is Squadron Leader Philip SMITH, R.A.A.F. He's one
of the most experienced pilots to take part in this operation.
For him, this is his 51st mission, and he's the deputy
of the Master Bomber. If need arises, he's to take over from
him. He has already completed a tour as a Wellington skipper,
with 103 Sqn, in 1941-1942. He
was mentioned in dispatches in the London Gazette of June 2
1943, for distinguished service. Then follows a rest as an instructor,
at the end of which he's posted to 467 Sqn. In this unit led
by Wing
Commander J.R. BALMER, acting Squadron
Leader D.P.S. SMITH is also "A" flight
C.O., another important job added to his task of pilot and skipper.
On
February 24 1944, the latter wrote to his family : "Soon
after our arrival on Squadron, I lost my first pilot on a raid
to Dusseldorf. The crew was then split up and I was posted as
rear gunner to an Australian Squadron Leader, quite a nice chap
who has already completed one tour, and may God spare him for
a second." Let
Philip SMITH tell himself the following events : "Our
target for the night of 10 may 1944 was a railway yard which
I believe was just to the south east of Lille. At the point
of dropping bombs all about me turned hot and dry and red. When
the flames extinguished, I could not feel the aeroplane about
me, so I undid my seat belt and released my parachute. When
my parachute opened, I found that one of the two main support
belts was half cut through, so I held on above the cut and this
helped to soften my landing. I
landed in a grassed field not far to the east of the group of
houses where there were several people watching the raid. I
would expect that I landed a little to the east of the railway
yards and that the remains of my aircraft would have fallen
in the same general area. I buried my parachute and mae-west
in a pile of road building stones several hundred meters to
the east of the group of houses. I then headed in a south east
direction, the aim being to get away as far as possible as quickly
as possible from the site of the raid. After having crossed
a railway, I soon came to a heavy barbed wire fence, which I
took for the boundary of the fighter aerodrome to the south
east of our target
[Lille-Lesquin]. Basis
the guarding of English aerodromes, I reckoned that it would
be better to walk across the aerodrome rather than make a long
detour around it. Accordingly I started to look for a way under
the wire but as soon as I did this shots rang out. I had not
been challenged but felt sure that they were meant for me. I
changed my mind immediately and crept off as quietly as possible
in a north easterly direction."
2
weeks previously, new regulations had arrived in units. Bomber
pilots were authorised to wear seat-type parachute instead of
the back pack, stored in the plane until it was hooked in case
of need. Philip SMITH had obeyed this new order, and in fact
it saved his life. (By the way, he also became a member of the
famous and coveted Caterpillar club). Philip
SMITH landed in Lezennes, while his Lancaster crashed near rue
Victor Hugo, in the same town. He had lost his flying helmet
and a flying boot in the process. He had also received tiny
scraps of metal : one in the little finger of his left hand,
another in his left forearm (which would be extracted years
later !) and another one, bigger, in his left thigh, which would
work its way out a few weeks later. At last, flames managed
to burn him between his glove and his sleeve, burning his left
wrist. He was also suffering some burns on the face, but he
never know too much about them, having no mirror at the time
! Despite
his wounds, he manages to reach in a few hours the Maneuville
hamlet, outside Orchies. There, he was sheltered by M. and Mme
DECRAEMER. A few days later, Philip SMITH has to leave. While
they have been briefed to try to reach Spain from occupied France,
he decides to try to make it to Switzerland, a direction he
thinks less evaders are taking. He reached Somain, then eventually
arrives in Audencourt, near Caudry. There, Gaston MÉLY, farm
worker for Olivier LEFEBVRE, Maire of the small village, discovers
the wounded pilot in the farm barn. As too many people come
to the farm, and this being dangerous when hiding an airman,
it is decided to take care and hide the airman at Gaston and
Lucienne MÉLY's home, up to the "Libération" of Caudry,
September 3 1944. 2 days later, Philip SMITH is back in England. In
the mean time, on July 11 1944, the award of his Distinguished
Flying Cross is gazetted, "for having accomplished a number
of operational sorties, during which he showed high skill and
fortitude, and devotion to duty. He was Mentioned in Despatches
last year. He has since been reported missing in action over
enemy territory." After his return, he will never take
part in operations any more. A close look at his log-book shows
a grand total of 1314 flying hours since he had joined in. His
6 crewmates are buried in Lezennes communal cemetery, together
with 3 brothers in arms from the same Sqn. It seems the mortuary
cleaning was done by a nun. In 1948, Mrs JOHNSTON and PARKER
came to lay flowers on the graves of their lost sons, the former
having made the journey from Australia ! Back
in Australia, after his demob, he becomes a chemist in the sugar
industry, marries Mollie, a young war widow, and breeds 4 children.
In 1978, he comes back in Caudry, to express his thanks to the
MÉLY family with whom he has always kept in touch. In 1994,
I start gathering information’s about the raid of 10/11 may
1944, and found a propeller blade from Philip SMITH' bomber
at the crash site. Contact is soon established in 1995, and
an exchange of letters starts between us. In
December 1999, I welcome in my home in Aubers his son Michael,
with his wife Mary and his daughter Mollie, together with Michel
MÉLY, Gaston's grand son with his niece Valérie. They are most
interested in the Lancaster propeller blade, one of the parts
of the future local air museum I'm trying to settle. While talking,
I mention my fore coming trip to New-Zealand. And following
the suggestion of Michael, the idea to make a diversion in Sydney
was born, in order to meet, after 5 years of writing letters,
the former Australian Lancaster pilot.
This
is how, on the 13 and 14 April 2000, I spent a few hours with
Philip SMITH and his next-of-kin, in Sydney. So long after the
event, he still ignores exactly how his plane was shot down
: FLAK, night-fighter, mid-air collision with another plane
or even a bomb from a bomber flying higher ? One can also notice
a kind of guilt feeling, guilt to be the only survivor of 12
crews fallen in full youth in a few seconds of noise and fury.
Joss
Leclerq and DPS Smith . On
June 22 1944, Lille-Fives repair shops are again the target
of another raid. By day, and American. FLAK guns will again
take their toll, in this case a Boeing B-17 "Flying Fortress".
Out of 9 crewmembers, only the radio S/Sgt Robert JOHNSON would
survive and evade capture. Yet another survivor, yet another
story.
CONTACT email
Jocelyn "Joss"
LECLERCQ Address
Jocelyn
"Joss" Leclercq sources : ·
letters,
personal documents and interview of Philip SMITH, ·
R.A.F
records held in the Public Record Office, Kew, Londres :
AIR 25/110, 25/122, 24/273, 27/128, 27/488, 27/768, 27/1921
et 27/1931 ·
Bomber
Command Losses volume 5
1944, William CHORLEY, M.C.P., ·
Commonwealth
War Graves Commission registers ·
Bomber
Command War Diary, MIDDLEBROOK et EVERITT, PENGUIN, Thanks
to : Philip
and Mollie SMITH, Michael, Mary and Mollie ANDERSON, Michel
MÉLY, Lieutenant-colonel Lionel LACEY-JOHNSON
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