'Spitfire Groundcrew Under Fire' Book

Signed hardback copy by author Mark Hillier - with introductory price discount!
 
So often it is the daring, even dashing exploits of fighter pilots which attract the most interest. Theirs is, indisputably, the glory – but not theirs alone for it is the groundcrew who kept the aircraft in the sky and who deserve a share in that glory.

The bond between pilots and their groundcrew was often an immensely powerful one. Each day they took to the sky, the pilots put their lives in the hands of the fitters who kept their engines at maximum efficiency, the riggers who maintained the airframe and refuelled the aircraft and the armourers who serviced the guns and loaded the bombs. The ground crew, the ‘Erks’, were only too aware of the responsibility they bore. Nothing could be overlooked. Everything had to be done correctly, often under enormous time pressure and in conditions that were far from ideal. Those conditions included coming under attack from the enemy, as the title of this absorbing and unusual book indicates.
 
It was at his first wartime posting at St Eval near Padstow in Cornwall that Joe Roddis first came under fire in July 1940. This was a minor affair though, when compared with what was to come.

As the Battle of Britain grew in ferocious intensity, Joe’s squadron, No. 234, moved to Middle Wallop – the groundcrew being flown in just as the airfield came under attack from the Luftwaffe. Joe was now firmly on the front-line and his descriptions of the attacks inflicted upon Middle Wallop are detailed and exciting. Even more fascinating are his explanations of how every aircraft was prepared by the groundcrew, as they turned round the Spitfires as rapidly as possible to get them back into the air to beat off the enemy attackers. Under immense pressure, each function had to be carried out with great care and attention and had to be checked off before the aircraft could be released. The tension was immense.

In September, the Battle of Britain, having passed its peak, No. 234 Squadron returned to St Eval where Joe remained until being posted to 485 (New Zealand) Squadron at RAF Driffield in March 1941. The squadron moved a number of times, to Leconfield, Redhill, Kenley and Kings Cliffe while undertaking offensive operations across the Channel. 458 (New Zealand) Squadron was eventually posted to RAF Westhampnett where, among other tasks, it undertook night patrols.

Joe’s squadron was heavily involved before and during the D-Day landings and he and his fellow groundcrew were shipped over to France to support the pilots as the fighting moved ever closer to Germany. It is in those months after the Normandy invasion that Joe writes more expansively, his story culminating in the Luftwaffe’s last futile throw of the dice – Operation Bodenplatte.

There was, of course, a personal side to Joe’s life and a surprising post-war reunion adds a touch of heart-warming tenderness to a story well-told. It is a story in which Joe personally faced death and destruction on at least nine occasions.