Inspector Yarrow

Chapter 3

The first time he had been shot down, he had been lucky.

He had just shot down a Dornier Do17 ‘Flying Pencil’ bomber (so called because of its long sleek and narrow airframe) when the Me 109 came out of the sun and shot away large pieces of his tail plane. ‘Green 2 baling out!’ he called through the RT, then undid his harness and disconnected the RT and his oxygen mask.

The canopy slid back easily and flipping the Hurricane onto its back, he fell out of the cockpit without difficulty, his parachute opening in a bloom of white silk above him. The Me 109 came round again and Yarrow thought the German was going to machine g*n him as he swung helplessly in his parachute, it was not unknown for pilots to be shot in that way. Alan Bird had died like this and Polish pilots in the RAF routinely shot at German pilots dangling in their parachutes or flew so close above the parachute that the canopy would collapse from the backwash, sending the pilot plummeting to his death.

Polish pilots were even known to strafe German aircrew in dinghies after being brought down in the Channel, retribution for the destruction and dismemberment of their country. But this time the German pilot merely waggled his wings in acknowledgment of a fellow warrior of the skies and then turned away, fleeing back across the Channel before his fuel ran out.

The fields of Kent spread out before Yarrow like a Turkish carpet, bright greens and the gold of ripening corn, the red clay roof tiles of a village, a silver curl of a sunlight reflected river, a stand of dark-green-trees swaying lightly in the summer breeze, cows stolidly chewing their cud, the grey-blue haze of the Channel dotted with ships away in the distance as above a criss-cross pattern of con trails from the aerial battles shivered against the brilliant azure sky.

He landed safely in a turnip field but was immediately surrounded by farmers with pitchforks and scythes, thinking that he might a German agent dressed in RAF uniform. Foolishly he had scrambled without his wallet and identity card and, unable to convince the farmers that he was English, had been marched away to the nearest police station, luckier than at least one pilot he knew of who had been stabbed to death by farmers with pitchforks under suspicion of being a spy.

Still unable to convince anyone that he is an English pilot rather than a German spy, he was put in a cell with four Germans. They were the crew of a Dornier Do17 bomber, quite possibly the one that Yarrow had just shot down, the second kill to his name. He gave his squadron telephone number to the duty sergeant, asking him to contact the airfield to verify his story and expected to be freed as soon as somebody arrived to pick him up.

The Germans were friendly enough, one of them, Franz the bomb aimer, spoke good English and they bore him no animosity for possibly shooting them down. They had not been injured and had been able to safely bail out well before the bomber crashed to the ground in flames.

They were, they told him candidly, attached to Luftlotte 2, I Gruppe, stationed in Cormeilles-en-Vexin, just across the Channel in the Pas-de-Calais area. However despite the open friendliness of the Germans, Yarrow was far less forthcoming about his own squadron and airfield, making no mention that he flew with 249 squadron out of Boscombe Down airfield in Wiltshire, not far from Stonehenge.

The five airmen, four German and one Englishman shared cigarettes, swapped names and Werner the pilot, slightly older than the others, showed Yarrow photographs of his wife, a dumpy dough-faced woman staring wide eyed into the camera and two surprisingly beautiful daughters dressed in Hitler Youth uniforms, their long blonde hair in plaits, open faces shining in fervent adoration of the Führer.

The Germans were philosophical about their impending incarceration in a British prisoner of war camp; eagerly telling Yarrow that it was only a matter of time before Germany invaded England and they would be released.

Strange, he thought, the Germans have no difficulty in believing me to be English, but I can’t persuade my own people that I am.

‘Spitfire pilot, ja?’ asked Franz as they shared cigarettes.

ja?‘No, Hurricane.’

‘Hurricane! Nein, nein.’ There was a heated discussion amongst the German aircrew before Franz turned back to Yarrow. ‘For us to be shot down by Spitfire, sehr gut, very good. Hurricane, no, not so good. Big shame,’ but this was said with a smile on his face and Werner went on to explain that among German fighter pilots, not bomber pilots, it was considered somewhat shameful to be shot down by a Hurricane.

Nein, neinsehr gutYarrow tried to explain that he had flown both Spitfires and Hurricanes and found the Hurricane the better fighter of the two, not quite so fast or so tight in the turn but a very stable g*n platform able to absorb considerable punishment.

It was more than two hours later when the cell door opened and the Adjutant, Sq. Ldr Willoughby peered in. He took one look at Yarrow and shook his head. ‘No!’ he said, ‘I never saw this man before’ and the door slammed shut again.

‘Sir, it’s me Pilot Officer Yarrow, Christopher Yarrow,’ he shouted, but to no avail. The cell door remained resolutely closed, solid and unyielding.

The Germans thought it highly amusing. ‘Now you are one of us,’ Franz, the English speaker chortled, ‘You come with us to prison camp, we make you German pilot.’

Another hour went by before the door opened again and the Adjutant beckoned Yarrow out. ‘Next time’ he admonished as they got into his MG to drive back to the squadron airfield ‘make sure you carry your Identity Card’