Hudson, Doug: my Air Force recollections (November 25, 2006)
Interviewer: Young, Craig
Interviewee: Hudson, Doug
An interview/narrative of Doug Hudson's experiences during World War II. Chief Warrant Officer Hudson served with the Royal Canadian Air Force. Interview took place on November 25, 2006.
Rank: Chief Warrant Officer.
ABSTRACT: Chief Warrant Officer Doug Hudson Doug Hudson fought in the 420 squadron with the number six group. Adopted by the city of London of Ontario. Got boxes of oranges for Christmas. Lived on a farm east of Winnipeg. Walked to town and was going down main street. He was planning on enlisting in the navy, but walked past as sign that said RCAF recruiting. He asked "can I get a air crew?", He was told "sit down and sign here". He was signed up as a wireless air gunner (WAG), however he never touched a gun. In 1942, He went to number 3 wireless school, which taught him as he described a new language. Repeating over and over. He was 21 years old when he enlisted, because he waited for his sister to turn 16 years old to drive the tractor on the farm. That day he enlisted. He memorized Morris code. And constantly repeated it over and over. Went to operation training unit. That is where they crewed up. He stayed back and was approached by a pilot and a navigator and they asked him to join his crew, because they were looking for a WAG. The crew was tight, as they had absolute trust in each other. First mission in Bochum Germany in 1944. Completed 32 missions. 30 was a tour. Never discussed how many missions they had to go. When they had 28 missions in, they upped the tour to 35, because it was near the end of the war. There was no point in training more, when there was only a couple missions to go. When in the briefing room on their 32 mission, they were told that anyone with over 30 missions was to be grounded. As a result they were screened. This was in May of 1945. Morale in crew was "excellent". Because they had complete trust in each other. Their attitude was that there was nothing they could do but have trust in each other's ability to do their duties. "if you got hit, you got hit, there was nothing you could do". The crew stayed together the entire time. They had a mid-upper gunner disappear in between missions. So they got a spare gunner. Other than that they said together the whole time. They flew with H2S. Flying the Halifax 3 radial engines. Canadians did not get the Lancaster until the end of the war. Felt safe in the Halifax's. Battle of the Bulge Were bombing between Christmas and New years. They flew 3 days in a row. One time they had a 1,000 pound hang up. They could not drop it on occupied territory, so they went to the disposal area in the North Sea. There was an enemy fighter (Focke-Wulf 190) in the area that the tail gunner spotted, so they headed to the emergency landing field in the east coast of England that was three runways wide for crippled planes to land. They still had the hang up and were worried about the bomb going off in the touchdown, because it was fused and selected. They took crash positions and waited for the touchdown. They rolled to a slow stop and "jumped out of the plane and ran like hell". "The pilot said he was running as hard as he bloody well could and the tail gunner passed him like he was standing still". Nine out of the 32 missions. They did not make it back to base, because of flack damage, weather, lack of fuel, but they always made it back to England. Flying without lights and always without lights. Flew so close to each other. (attitudes of RAF) The British treated the Canadians poorly, because they were "just a bunch of colonials". The caught a lot of negative attitude from them. (disadvantages of being Colonials in the RCAF) Flying out of Yorkshire, they had the furthest distance to fly and had the coldest and roughest weather. There was one instance where the airfield landed in the snow, which was plowed the wrong way. They landed and hit the snow bank and threw the plane off course and they were heading towards the maintenance hangar. The pilot lifted the wheels, and that slowed them a little. The air crew bailed out of the crew shack so quickly, as they thought they were going to crash right into them. (disadvantages of being Colonials in the RCAF) (RCAF not getting along with the Locals) They had a aircraft blow up on takeoff just off the airfields and it blew up a barn. At the local pub the air crew and the farmers were drinking together and "the farmers were raising hell about the bloody air planes blowing up over their barns, and little did they realize that there were 7 guys in that bloody air plane that got blown up with it". They did not get along with the locals. They did not appreciate their attitudes. (Hochenwald forest- Battle of the Bulge). In 1945 during a day raid. They were assigned to bomb the Hochenwald forest and clear the ground for the advancing Canadian army troops. The army was approaching the Hochenwald forest and they were briefed if the army had moved up ahead into the forest, then they were to abort the mission if they heard the code word basement. They had the bomb doors open and were about to drop the bombs, and at the last minute they heard over the communications radio, "Basement". So they aborted the mission and pulled out of there. This good communication saved the lives of the Canadian troops. Doug was extra cautious with this mission, because had previously dropped bombs on their own troops in Con. This was due to no communication, and according to Doug, the army never forgave them for that. Doug lost his brother in law there who was fighting with the Manitoba Dragoons. Who got "plastered there". RCAF did not fly in formation, they flew in a gaggle at night. They were not trained to fly in formation. All flew on their own and saw planes all around them. They could not fly formation at night. The Americans kept formation in the Day time. The Americans could not break formation. The RCAF "would take violent evasive action" to avoid flack. Doug said he "did not know how the Halifax's stayed together". The Germans had upward firing guns. With the ME 110 and the Focke-Wulf 190's. The Guns on the Halifax's were sufficient. Had four 303 mill guns and a .5 mill gun shooting down. RAF and the RCAF would join up together in waves for the raids. Story of how a bomber dropped his load to early and took off the nose of the plane and the navigator, pilot and WAG fell out of the pane. No parachutes, except for the tail gunner. The Strategy came from Bomber Command. As how much fuel and bombs they would carry, and where they would meet up. Used Pathfinders to mark the target. Master bomber directed the target markers. Was a more accurate way to hit the targets (Contrary to what the secondary sources say) "The Pathfinders were master navigators". There crew was slated to become part of the Pathfinders. This was around their 20th missions in. The crew discussed this opportunity, and came to a collective decision, not to join. The reason being they did not think they would complete their tour as it was getting closer towards the end of the war and the Pathfinders did not fly as often. This complement revels what an outstanding crew they had. Had fighter escorts following D day as they were freeing up airports. The fighters could stay in Europe and follow them over. As France, Belgium and Holland were back in allied hands. Focused on specific targets or area bombing? Area bombing near the end. Hit oil plants, ammunition dumps and manufacturing factories. (7 min) Recalls Hamburg raid. Intelligence told them that they were going to give up on targets and were deliberately going to go after the people. The factories could be rebuilt in 3 months and be back in full production. So they bombed the people in the cities. They way they did this was; the first wave came in and dropped high explosive to knock the buildings down. Then came in with incendiaries to start the fires. Then the rebel from the first wave would start the burning. The third wave would go in and drop more explosives to spread the burning around. He has a friend who denies it and said it is bull shit. They did not bomb the people. Doug admits that they did it deliberately and they knew this by the way the bomb load was set up. They were young and did not think anything of it. Doug said, "at the time we did not care, it was just a raid". He has admits he has thought of it since and his perspective has changed. (10:27) (11:40)After asking Mr. Hudson if Bomber Command was responsible for the bombing of the civilians as a retaliatory measure for the blitz in London, he responded, "No, but Churchill did". Mr. Hudson wife was from Coventry. His wife explained to him what her experiences were like while living through the Coventry raids. Her family spent their nights in bomb shelters and one morning they woke up and not only was their house gone, but the entire neighborhood was wiped out. She survived the Coventry raids. Mr. Hudson felt that since the Germans deliberately bombed the people of Coventry, Churchill had no hesitation to retaliate and deliberately bomb German cities. As a crew they never mentioned the bombing of the civilians to each other. (12:50) (22:20) the bombings were an attack on the German Morale was the intent. They were told, "they could rebuild the factories, but they cannot rebuild the people". He lists the missions that deliberately bombed the civilians, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Kamness and Hamburg( because it was a manufacturing center in the Ruhr Valley). Doug participated in the Leipzig and Hamburg missions.(23:50) Flew T terror was the name of their air craft, flew k King on one raid. This plane was a "Dog". It was bad. They were lucky to get home. They were happy to get T-Terror back as it was a great plane. The tail gunner called it T-Tits. They had broaches made that they put on their jackets. A WAG was sick and Doug volunteered to go. He went to the briefing and was going to do the mission, but at the last minute. Red, the man who was sick, talked the doctor into letting him go. Doug just had enough time to give him the codes and they switched. They never returned. A few days later their tail gunner walked into the bar and told Doug that they got lost off course and ran into a hill in a mountainous region in England. The tail part of the plane got knocked off and he rolled down the hill. He woke up in the morning. Climbed to the top of the hill and saw that everything was burnt. Red's body was burnt. That night they got really drunk and celebrated their luck. The pilot then told his crew that they were not allowed to volunteer for missions away from their crew. When Doug was about to take off with the crew, he had a gut feeling that there was something wrong with that crew. He knew that he had made a mistake. Then he saw Red coming and they switched spots with each other. Bombing of Marshaling yards (rail yards) was a common target. Towards the end of the war they were bombing V-Bombs in France and Germany. Hitting V-Bombs manufacturing plants and the sites they were sent from. Said he got blown out of bed by V-Bombs while on leave in England and he said "forget this I am going back to duty". Doug went home on leave after he was screened and was going to go to Greenwood Nova Scotia to train troops for bombers in Japan, but before this happened the Japanese quite the war. Doug took a year off and was back in the air force for 32 more years. He served as a technician and then an instructor teaching history. His retired as a Chief Warrant Officer 1st class. He then left the air force in 1970, and became a hotel account. Jets fighters became difficult advisories towards the end of the war. They encountered the Jets fighters, the Me 262. They moved so fast the gun turrets could not follow them. The Jet fighters would suddenly appear without warning and shoot down a bomber and disappear. Bomber Command new about the Jet fighters, but they did not warn the bomber crews, because they did not want to scare the bomber crews. They hit the Hamburg Shipyards continually. Which were making advanced snorkel equipment for U-boats which were capable of long distance underwater cruising. They would be told at the time why they were going there. The Ruhr was one of the most well defended area's in Germany. They had plenty of Anti aircraft protection. Catching heavy Flack. They could would come home with so many holes they could not hold soup. Story of the taking heavy evasive action and having the Elson can spew all over the sealing. Could not look the ground crew in the eye. Never had to abort a mission because of a failure. Talks about the advantages of Oral history. He was able to tell his students stories that they would never read in a book. He admits that would embellish a little bit. (1:17)
- In Collection:
- 3 sound recordings (MP3)
- 52.16045, -0.70312
- 51.5, 10.5
- Original recordings (CDA) on compact discs (CD) in Special Collections.
- Canadian Military Oral History Collection
- HD_512
- Special Collections Finding Aid: https://uvic2.coppul.archivematica.org/military-oral-history-collection
- January 18, 2013
- Digital sound recording in .wav format at 16 bits and 44 kHz. In .mp3 format at 56 kbps and 44 kHz. Digitized by JF, technical and cataloguing metadata provided by JF and JP. Interview migrated to digital format for UVic Special Collections in 2013. Migration metadata by KD and MT.
- Rights
- This interview has been posted with the understanding that it may be used for research purposes only. Should the interviewee or their heirs have any objections to this interview being accessible on the Internet, it will be removed promptly. Contact UVic Special Collections for permission if using for other than research purposes: speccoll@uvic.ca
- DOI
| Thumbnail | Title | Date Uploaded | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|
|
SC141_MilitaryOralHistory_GenericThumbnail |
|
|
|
Hudson_D_0512_01.mp3 |
|
|
|
|
Hudson_D_0512_02.mp3 |
|
|
|
|
Hudson_D_0512_03.mp3 |
|