Reorganising the ravaged squadron took time, especially as they could not call upon other fighter units to scrounge spares and compatible equipment, for 616 flew the Gloster Meteor, Britain’s first operational jet fighter aircraft.
This morning, 616 Squadron was tasked with flying top cover to a large air raid tasked with striking the rail yards in Winsen, and also knocking down a number of bridges spanning the Luhe River, from Winsen south through Roydorf and Luhdorf down to Bahlberg.
The mission had been thrown together quickly in response to the huge Soviet attack, and it had all the hallmarks of Fred Karno’s circus, as different squadrons jostled to secure their places in the grand scheme.
RAF Bomber squadrons, who normally flew at night, were accompanied by NF30 Mosquitoes whose normal working day also started when the sun went down.
The ground attack squadrons flew ahead, savaging static and mobile anti-aircraft positions, beating up anything that might stop the bombers.
An attempt to keep some sort of formation had been given up as a bad job and so the six heavy bomber squadrons flew more as gaggles than an organised stream, each aircraft seeking out its objective individually, although pathfinder Mosquitoes were tasked to mark the main targets.
616 Squadron had nine airworthy Gloster Meteors that morning, and every one of them was committed to this maximum effort call.
Ahead of the bomber force, the ground attack boys were having a field day, and at higher levels, the RAF Spitfires and Mustangs were having good success against the Soviet aircraft trying to respond to the incursions.
Flight-Lieutenant Pieter De Villiers was a South-African who had shipped to England when the mother country called. He had served with distinction throughout the conflict, accruing four kills and thousands of flying hours in his five years of war, all but the last ten months flown in various marks of Spitfire. Now he rode the sky in a Meteor F3 jet fighter, the best that Britain could provide, flying shotgun on a squadron of Lancaster’s due to visit hell upon Bahlberg.
Scanning the sky left and right, high and low, he spotted the dots to the southeast. Focussing in, he counted at least twenty and confirmed they were inbound, all in a matter of two seconds.
“Gamekeeper, Gamekeeper, twenty-plus bandits inbound, two o’clock, level. Type unknown.”
The Squadron commander rattled off his instructions, and the nine Meteors accelerated and manoeuvred to attack. Immediately one aircraft fell out of formation spewing smoke as its portside Rolls-Royce Derwent engine objected to the stresses of full-power and broke down.
The other eight prescribed a steady upward curve, gaining height before charging down upon their enemy, ‘matter of factly’ identified as La-5’s by the Squadron ‘know-it-all’, Baines.
The Soviet pilots turned and rose to meet the aggressor’s, climbing at an impressive rate as their big radial engines poured out the power, some firing their 20mm cannon in short bursts to distract their enemy.
In turn, the Squadron Commander employed his own Hispano cannon and was rewarded with an immediate kill, as shells tore through a La5’s wing and sent the aircraft spinning away.
Having disrupted the initial attempt to get at the bombers, 616 Squadron concentrated on ensuring none broke through.
By comparison to the Lavochkin, the Meteor enjoyed advantages in nearly every department. True to their teachings, and on this occasion, the attack plan, the Russian pilots tried to draw their enemy downwards where low altitude was normally an equaliser for them. Not so against the Meteor, and four Soviet pilots were already under silk as their abandoned aircraft crashed beneath them. A fifth La-5 carried its pilot into the ground.
The Soviet pilots did not lack courage, but the La-5 was a short-legged aircraft at the best of times, and combat manoeuvres were always heavy on fuel. They broke off the attack and dived for the ground as they fled eastwards. Ordering Blue flight to pursue, the Squadron Commander took the remaining five aircraft back to their position above the bomber force, just in time to spot the approach of a large force of fighters from the northeast, which Baines believed to be the latest Yakolev’s.
By design, the Soviet air commander had used the La-5’s to draw off the escorts and delayed sending in his high-altitude Yak-9U’s to give them a clear run at the bombers.
It nearly worked, but for the Meteor’s excellent climb rate and higher speed.
Despite that, one Lancaster fell victim to a speculative burst at range, the Yak’s 20mm ShVAK cannon striking home and reducing the nose and cockpit to a charnel house. The huge bomber fell away as the living attempted to escape, leaving dead men holding shattered controls. Only four white mushrooms marked successful bail outs.
Summoning back Blue Flight, the Squadron Commander led his men into a side attack, disrupting the Yak’s and chopping three from the sky before they could properly react.
Below, De Villiers drove his own flight upwards, throttles to the max to get back to his charges.
His eyes focussed on the battle above and he saw the orange blossom of a large explosion, not realising that his commander and a junior Soviet pilot had come together in the melee, both aircraft disintegrating in a fireball, both pilots instantly dead.
Another Meteor was falling from the sky, one wing removed at the fuselage, rotating madly like a sycamore seed pod, a victim of cannon fire. The G forces held the wounded pilot in place all the way to its end.
Two more Yak’s were going down, one falling in a huge fireball to explode two thousand feet above the ground.
De Villiers throttled back and swept in behind a pair of Yaks intent on breaking through to the Lancaster’s of 460 Squadron.
His four Hispano cannons dispatched the first with ease, the heavy shells knocking the tail assembly into pieces, the Yak simply dropping away and rotating uncontrollably all the way to its end.
The second aircraft suddenly slowed, and De Villiers overshot his prey, registering the lowered undercarriage as he went and mentally congratulating his opponent. A steady rattle told the South African that his aircraft had been hit. His controls seemed fine, and he recovered his position in time to watch his wingman dispatch the second aircraft.
Probably a dozen Yaks had now been downed for the loss of two Meteors, plus one further jet staggering away streaming smoke from a damaged engine.
None the less, the Russian pilots drove in hard once more and succeeded in chopping another bomber from the sky before the remaining Meteors reorganised and forced them off again.
A pair of Yaks limped away, smoking badly, damaged and out of the fight, only to be chopped from the sky by a flight of Typhoons returning from savaging the Flak positions around Bahlberg.
Anxious to join in further, the four Typhoons applied power and rose higher, clawing another Yak from the sky before they were spotted.
Their arrival was enough for the Soviet Regimental Commander and he called off the attack, satisfied that his last burst had damaged another of the huge British bombers. The Yaks hauled off and dived away for the relative safety of their own lines.
Flying Officer Baines slid in behind the fighter that had just knocked lumps off a Lancaster and sent a stream of cannon shells into it, transforming the aircraft into a flying junk yard in the briefest moment and killing the pilot instantly.
The now leaderless Soviet Regiment withdrew to lick its wounds.
Realising that he was now the senior man, De Villiers organised his surviving aircraft, positioning the group correctly once more, just in time to watch 460 Squadron drop their bombs and turn for home.