My Life and Times as a BBC Engineer 1942-1945 Part 4

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Roger Marsh of the ‘Action Desk — Sheffield’ Team on behalf of Dennis Faulkner and has been added to the site with the author’s permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

By now I was an Honorary Member of the "Association of BBC Engineers", a sort of `in-house' trade union. Originally I had been a member of the "Staff (Wartime) Association". The two had now amalgamated. From time to time the secretary published a Report for all members. The last one I received stated that the annual membership fee had been increased to 12/-(60p)! This was paid by a quarterly deduction of 3/- (15p) from one's wages.

I also carried a "BBC Club" card. The club sports ground was at Motspur Park Surrey, not much use to us! There were club premises across the road from Broadcasting House in Portland Place. We did manage to go there a few times. However it was not much to the liking of young folk, who liked to be out and about. We used the large fast trams that ran all the way from Purley, through Croydon and on up through South London to the West End, or `Up West as the locals called it.

We were fortunate however in that an arrangement had been agreed with the "Old Mid-Whitgiftian Association" of Croydon, who had offered that we should take the fullest advantage of all the very nice facilities at Sanderstead, which included sports fields, cricket pitches, tennis courts and indoor sections. This was indeed very good, and we certainly made use of it. I managed to purchase a second-hand tennis racquet and became a team member. We also made use of the Purley Ice Rink. Here too, I managed to acquire a pair of ice skates. So, all in all, our `free' time was well filled with all sorts of activities. Cinemas were open too, and concerts took place in their respective places. We had an allocation of free tickets to some studio broadcasts and concerts. These were all `live' in those days. Specialist recording equipment was available in a few locations, but not usually for entertainment programmes. When it came round to tickets for the `Proms' at the Albert Hall, one of my shift colleagues, Esme Miller and I would make a bid for them and off we went, even if it meant `swopping' a shift to do so. Esme was married to an engineer whose job was to maintain the equipment at Tatsfield. She too was a TAIL They lived in Tatsfield village. She was to become a classical music mentor for me, dragging me off to concerts, the ballet, opera, and of course the Proms! I had become a collector of classical records and her advice was excellent. One could still purchase gramophone records (78rpm) in those days. However they were quite expensive, attracting triple tax. If one considers that say a symphony was on four discs and each one cost 10/- (50p). When LP's came in, many years later, a symphony would be on one disc at £1. Work and leisure filled our lives and I can honestly say I thoroughly enjoyed it.

As the spring of 1944 approached, the RAF commenced setting up `Barrage Balloons' in the area all along the top of the hills very close to our station. Indeed one was just across the lane from our gate in a corner of a field, literally yards from the office building. It was mounted on a concrete base with a motor driven winch. The three airmen who manned it lived in a tent.

We were officially informed that this was a defensive measure to counter a new type of enemy aircraft that was expected to be launched against London in the coming months. We were reminded of the `official secrets act we had all signed.

A Klaxon hooter alarm was installed in the building. The operating button was on an outside wall in the car park. From the beginning of June, as I recall, one of us had to take a turn outside, to watch for these `planes' and raise the alarm if one came too close for comfort. 'D-Day', the allied invasion of Europe, commenced on the 6th June and the air was filled with aircraft, all going out! A week later, at about 6.OOam. On the 13th June, I was `on watch' and heard the most extraordinary noise coming from the southeast. It was unlike any other aircraft I had heard and was a sort of pulsing sound of low frequency. Searching the sky my eyes lit on a small aircraft with a tube mounted on top and to the rear. Coming from this tube was a sheet of flame. It was flying quite low above our altitude, and passed over and continued in a straight line of flight. I watched it until it was out of site. Others had heard it too and came out to investigate.

This was probably one of the first pilotless German V1 `Flying Bombs' to be launched against England. It was a small, unmanned aircraft, powered by a 10ft long pulsejet engine mounted on top of, and to the rear of the fuselage. It was 22ft long with a 17ft wingspan and carried an 18701bs high explosive warhead. Its cruising speed was 400mph and flew at an altitude between 800 and 2300ft. The engine was powered by kerosene and had a capacity of 130 gallons.

Due to the unique sound made by the engine, they quickly earned nicknames, either "Doodle-Bug", or "Buzz- Bomb".

The aircraft was launched from a mobile ramp, with a pre-determined course and altitude maintained by a gyroscope. The actual amount of fuel carried was determined by the estimated distance of travel, from the launch site to the target, London. The early launches took place in the Pas-de-Calais region of France, moving further north into Belgium and Holland as the Allied Armies advanced.

The knowledge that these weapons existed and were being developed, and also the V2, had been known since they were revealed by aerial reconnaissance in 1943, which resulted in the subsequent Allied air raids on their manufacturing and development site at Peenemunde in North Germany. This explains the installation of the Barrage Balloons and also the move of most of the Anti-Aircraft guns from around London, to the coastal areas. These were replaced, locally, by newly developed anti-aircraft rocket launchers.

About two weeks later, I was again doing a period of "Doodle-Bug" watch, when I witnessed one heading directly toward our position. However, even though it was quite low, it did not appear to pose any threat, as its engine was on full power, and was intended to fly onwards towards London. To my horror I saw its port wing stub hit the balloon cable, near to our gate, and commence spiralling downwards toward the cable anchorage. I think I was mesmerised with alarm and failed to hit the klaxon. In seconds my whole visual field was enveloped in enormous sheets of flames of every conceivable colour. It was then I was engulfed in tremendous heat and was thrown back against the wall behind me. I cannot recall hearing any explosion. My next recollection was of my colleagues assisting me and fussing around. I was, in fact, totally unhurt, but badly shaken. Others dashed across the road to where the balloon had been tethered. There was nothing left except a large hole. The airmen, their equipment, and the bomb had vanished. We were all in a state of shock. Strangely enough, there was very little damage to the station buildings.

These weapons continued to be launched against London until 4th September 1944. In all, some 8,070 were launched, of which 2,300 evaded the defences and fell on Greater London. Of all London Boroughs, Croydon suffered the most, with 100% of all properties suffering some damage or destruction. The widespread damage was due to the way in which the blast travelled laterally.

Mr Jones, our landlord, was a retired builder and had a yard at the rear of the premises, (where I spent time building amplifying equipment for my gramophone etc.). He was called upon by the Civil Defence, to assist with 'first-aid' to buildings that, although damaged, were still habitable if made safe and waterproof. During our worst period, on returning to the `digs' from night shifts, and finding Croydon and our area had suffered badly, after breakfast instead of retiring to bed, we would go with him to assist with putting tarpaulins over roofs, boarding up windows and whatever else he was doing. We carried on with this routine for a whole week, taking a couple of hours sleep in the afternoon, before going off back to Tatsfleld. On the Friday we finished our period of `Nights' and commenced a few days leave. The area was relatively quiet and we were not needed for Civil Defence work. We were therefore able to go to bed and asked Mrs. Jones to wake us at 4.OOpm. We had decided to go to the local cinema in the early evening (incredible to think that during all the turmoil and uncertainty, cinemas and theatres were still operating). I was first to wake, with no sign of Mrs Jones. I woke David, and we eventually went downstairs, and seeing a newspaper, found that it was now Sunday! We had slept for something over 50 hours, completely losing a Saturday!

The BBC had been making preparations to evacuate Tatsfield Receiving Station for some time, however the facilities we were to move to, were not ready until the end of June.

CHAPTER 6. CROWSLEY PARK, OXFORDSHIRE.
On 7th July, I was in the vanguard of a move, with some of our equipment, taking most of a week, in order to maintain, as near as possible, continuity of operations. The place we went to was called Crowsley Park situated `in the middle of nowhere' about two miles from Sonning Common in South Oxfordshire. It lay about six miles north of Reading, which is in Berkshire. The BBC had requisitioned the whole of the park, and manor house. Here, a new single storey station had been built some 400 yards from the manor house itself. New aerial masts and arrays had been erected and the building was fully equipped, furnished and ready to receive our equipment and us. We moved in piecemeal until nearly all our equipment was in and working and the shift system maintained. One larger frequency measuring set had to be left behind. It was, however, located in the basement and relatively safe. One of the more elderly engineers who lived near to Tatsfield stayed behind to man this position.

Crowsley Park had once been one of the largest properties in South Oxfordshire and surrounded by a vast deer park. It was built in 1734 and had had a succession of owners. It had, what was described by the 19th century landscape architect, William Robinson, as an exemplary "wild garden". This consisted of a huge range of species in an arboretum, including palm trees and exotic shrubs from all over the world.

In a small part of the Georgian Manor House, we were told; some of the family were still in residence, one of whom was in poor health. There were two bachelor brothers, Geoffrey Baskerville, MA, F.R.Hist.S, a historian, who wrote many books and articles, also his brother the Rev. Humphrey, and a married sister, Mrs Capel Young. Their father had been Col. John Baskerville, who had hounds on his family crest. The family had purchased the estate in 1845.

The entrance gates were awesome. Each of the large stone gateposts was topped with a stone 'hellhound' with a spear through their mouths! According to an ancient Norse legend, if the spears are dislodged from the mouths of these symbols of suppressed evil, the crack of doom will ring out the end for us all!!!

Above the front entrance porch over the Coat of Arms was another large hound. On entering the black and white tiled hallway, a wide oak stairway rose on the left to a large landing. The handrail had carved hounds heads at intervals along it. This place, even in summer, made me shiver and feel cold. Fortunately we were not required to go there often. The EiC and his staff had rooms on the upper floor, and the canteen occupied some of the ground floor with a door directly to the outside. Other ground floor rooms were used by the BBC Valve Department, to store the large, expensive transmitter valves.

Outside, along one side of the driveway, was a large elaborate brick kennelling block with a capacity for many hunting hounds in a series of pens with both internal and external runs. It was all sadly neglected and overgrown. On the other side of the driveway were substantial stabling blocks. The one nearest to the driveway housed our emergency stand-by diesel powered electrical generator. In the event of mains supply failure, it would start automatically and switch over. It was the duty of the incoming Night Shift to stop here on the way and test the generator. It made quite a noise.

There were still deer in the park. However they no longer had the freedom to roam, due to our presence, and were in a large enclosure to the rear of the house for their safety. As I recall they were mainly Fallow deer. It was interesting to see them towards dusk. They formed a tight group with the does surrounding the fawns all lying down, with the dominant and other stags patrolling round the perimeter.

Thus we were ensconced in our new premises and work continued as before, except that during breaks we now had the opportunity to explore this fascinating environment, the park and its buildings.

Chapter 1 can be viewed at www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/A7157081

Chapters 2 and 3 can be viewed at www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/A7157432

Chapters 4 and 5 can be viewed at www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/A7157621

Chapters 7, 8 and 9 can be viewed at www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/A7158224

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