He may be 107, but pilot's memories of 62 World War II missions he ran are still vivid
At the grand old age of 107 the memory of that day is still seared in the mind of Mr Richardson, who is now one of the last surviving Second World War bomber pilots.
Sitting in his home in Ochiltree, Ayrshire, the memory is as sharp as ever.
‘As we flew away, I looked back at the south-east coast of England and wondered if I would ever see it again,’ he told the Mail on Sunday.
He could so easily have never returned as the RAF Bomber Command aircrews – whose service and sacrifices changed the outcome of the war – suffered a brutally high 46 per cent death rate.
That mission was the first of 62 completed bombing missions Mr Richardson would make to Germany and occupied Europe and later over Burma and Malaysa until 1947, when the Japanese surrendered to the Allies, finally bringing the long war years to a close.
His outstanding bravery will be honoured at VE Day 80 - Victory in Europe 80th anniversary celebrations - on May 8 in South Ayrshire, where Mr Richardson settled after the war.
Mr Richardson flew a Vickers Wellington twin-engined medium bomber. It was widely used by the RAF as a night bomber in the early years of the Second World War
His love of flying began when he was 18 and unhappily working in an accountancy firm. He used to cycle past RAF Northolt near his home in West London, where his family had moved from Bolton.
‘I would watch these lovely airplanes flying around, taking off and landing and thought, that’s for me,’ Mr Richardson said.
‘Two weeks before the war, I tried to join the RAF but they said they weren’t taking on pilots. I knew I was in the first call-up so when war was declared I joined up straight away as a pilot.’
During flight training on Tiger Moth biplanes, he was singled out to be a bomber pilot and went on to fly Wellington Bombers with 149 Squadron in Europe before training other pilots in the Avro Anson, affectionately known as ‘Annie’.
At the tail end of the war, he was stationed in Calcutta, now Kolkata, with 159 Squadron, flying Liberator Bombers over ports and fuel tankers in Malaysia and Burma, now Myanmar.
All in all, he completed 62 dangerous missions when he was only expected to carry out 30.
One of his many close shaves was in 1941 as captain on a bombing mission to Duisberg in Germany when he and his aircrew met a Junkers Ju 88, a German night fighter plane.
‘We were in complete darkness when the searchlights sprang into life. Tracer bullets from a fighter appeared from astern. The rear gunner fired a burst but was hit – shot through the ankle – and the turret was put out of action.
Mr Richardson (far left) is pictured with the crew of his Wellington Bomber during the war
‘I decided to turn back as the gunner was injured and to jettison my bombs. But the enemy came in for another go. When I judged he was behind us – it was dark so I couldn’t see – I told the front gunman to fire and that was the last we saw of the fighter.
'A fire started on the ground and I thought it was the bombs we’d jettisoned. But when we got back to base, I discovered the mechanism to release the bombs hadn’t worked and we still had them. The explosion must have been the enemy plane.’
In another hair-raising exploit in 1942, Mr Richardson again cheated death, while saving the six-man crew and his plane, which was his responsibility as the captain.
On a bombing mission to Essen in Germany with 149 Squadron, he was flying at 8,000ft with cloud around 6,000ft below when searchlights picked up his plane’s position and kept it silhouetted as a target for the enemy fighters. The searchlights were eventually doused and he flew on.
But the searchlights found the plane again over The Hague and it came under attack from ‘flak’ – the name British airmen gave to Germany’s heavy antiaircraft gun. When an 88mm projectile exploded at altitude, it sent out jagged metal fragments that tore through any nearby aircraft with sometimes deadly consequences.
‘I realised there was only one thing to do and pushed the nose down and corkscrewed down until I was only about 300 feet up and could see rooftops plainly,’ Mr Richardson said.
‘The searchlights still held us in spite of our gunners putting some of them out. So down I went further, just a few feet over the buildings to fly under the searchlights, all the while keeping an eye out for steeples.’
He managed to get away from the city but a fighter was soon on his tail. The enemy was closing in as they reached the sea and flew over a flak ship.
The Liberator aircraft Mr Richardson later flew during bombing runs in Southeast Asia
‘Just before this, the fighter opened up and the rear gunner replied, but as the flak ship opened up, the fighter sheared off. Several hits were scored by the flak ship but the rear gunner might have put one of their guns out of action.
‘One shell exploded inside our cabin putting holes through the navigator’s seat, table, and one of his maps, and through the hydraulic tank, which we sealed with chewing gum before much was lost. We lost a door through the blast, but we landed safely.’
Mr Harrison has a small piece of tangled metal saved from his plane from the Duisberg attack. It takes pride of place along with photograph albums of his RAF comrades and his medals in his home in Ochiltree, East Ayrshire, where he lives with his 80-year-old daughter, retired nurse, Penny Richardson.
She will accompany her father to the VE Day 80 celebrations in Ayr.
‘I’m so proud of dad and everything he did during the war,’ she said.
Back when the whole of Britain was celebrating the first VE Day – the end of the World War II in Europe – Mr Harrison was 5,000 miles away in India with 159 squadron, flying Liberators. Their mission was to carry on fighting the Japanese by bombing ports and transport lines in Southeast Asia.
‘We had a few pints in the mess when the news came through. It was quite a relief, but we still had a job to do,’ said Mr Harrison.
VE Day 80 South Ayrshire organiser, RAF veteran Terry Wright, said: ‘Harry is a warrior and still has plenty of vim and vigour. He had to fight on while Europe was celebrating peace, which took a lot of gumption. His bravery is an inspiration.’
When Mr Richardson left the RAF, he was a Flight Lieutenant and had a chest full of medals –the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC), the War Star, the Air Crew Europe Medal, the Burma Star, and the Defence Medal.
His survival after fighting from 1939 to 1947 is all the more remarkable when contemplating the grim statistics about airmen in Bomber Command.
Most aircrew were aged between 19 and 25, with some as young as 16. More than 8,000 aircraft were lost in action and Bomber Command aircrews suffered a brutally high casualty rate – out of 126,000 aircrew, more than 57,000 were killed, a 46 per cent death rate. A further 8,400 were wounded in action and nearly 10,000 became prisoners of war.
There were few ‘giggles’ Mr Richardson says during the war years, but a brief respite came when he met his wife, Margaret, and they married in 1943. The couple had two girls, Penny in 1944, and Lynda, in 1947.
After the war, the family moved to Prestwick where Mr Harrison joined the National Air Traffic Service as an air traffic controller, assisting in the planning of the Air Traffic Service over the Atlantic. Sadly, Mrs Harrison died in 1989 at the age of 67 and he later married his second wife, Marjorie, in 1993 when they were both 75.
‘I always missed flying but Margaret was scared all through the war that I would be injured or worse. She made me promise not to fly again.’
But Mr Harrison was able to take to the skies again last year to celebrate his 106th birthday when he climbed into the cockpit with a pilot from Prestwick Flight Club and they flew over the Ailsa Craig.
He puts his longevity down to keeping active ‘physically and mentally’ and to ‘deep breathing’ and a loving, close family.
‘I think the secret is to pick the right parents, and make sure your genes are good. Keep active physically and mentally of course. Try not to get too excited all the time, it’s important to keep calm, and do lots of deep breathing.’
He became an original member of the Prestwick Royal Air Force Association (RAFA) 67 years ago and still goes there every Saturday night for a dance.
But throughout his long life, his love of flying never left him.
‘I used to go down to Wolverhampton where they would fly us veterans every year, but there’s not enough of us left to organise now.’
Mr Harrison is now looking forward to the VE 80th anniversary celebration that will see an artwork of aircrew silhouettes ‘Standing With Giants’ created by Dan Barton installed in Ayr, with other events between May 1 and 10.
But the celebrations will also be a poignant time for Mr Harrison.
‘I can’t feel proud because there won’t be any of the other guys there. I’ll be the only one.’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14526647/He-107-pilots-memories-62-World-War-II-missions-ran-vivid.html
