Operation Pinch
by
Bill Baldwin
Prologue
Tuesday, 16 June, 1942
Four twenty-five
a.m. on the instrument-panel clock. Cramped in the tiny cockpit
of a German Messerschmitt Bf 109F3 fighter plane, Vickers Supermarine
test pilot Drake Twist--an American--completed his preflight checkout
by flashlight in the darkened hangar. Occasional glimmers of distant
lightning from a retreating storm flashed through the open door,
illuminating black German crosses freshly painted on the wings,
replacing the red, white, and blue British roundels that he had
seen there as late as tea time. Once again, the captured Messerschmitt
wore German markings, and in a very few minutes, Twist, a British
civilian, planned to fly it against its original owners-in direct
contravention of the Geneva Convention's "rules" of
warfare. The circumstances gave him little sense of long-term
security. Nazi Germany reserved its cruelest tortures for interrogating
captured spies.
"Set to roll out, Mr. Twist?" a mustachioed aircraft
fitter asked from the left wing beside his cockpit.
Twist peered grimly out at the teeming gloom through the square,
armored-glass windshield, then nodded. "Ready, Sergeant Cross,"
he replied dourly.
"Best of luck, to ye, then, Mr. Twist," Cross said,
swinging the angular cockpit hood closed with a heavy-and final-sounding-thud.
Twist raised a fist in acknowledgment, then set the lock firmly
from inside while a five-man handling crew dressed in boots and
slickers began pushing the airplane outside. Heavy rain suddenly
drummed-pounded, was a better word-against the transparent Perspex
only inches from his leather pilot's helmet.
He ran his fingers around the windshield frame. Good, he considered-no
leaks today. Sylvia would be happy to know the new rubber seals
were finally holding.
|
Oh, right, he grumped to himself, grimacing at the specter of
the woman's angry, tear-streaked face the night before. Perhaps
"might have been happy" was better under present circumstances.
However, now seemed a rather poor time to dwell upon that unfortunate
situation . . . .
To his left on the rain-dimpled apron, three British Spitfire
MK VBs were already lined up on the tarmac. Twist pictured their
pilots: Squadron Leader Greg Camm, Flight Lieutenant Fen Beatty,
and Flight Lieutenant Phil Murphy-no fair-weather aviators those.
Before the war, all three-like himself-had served two-year stints
with the Royal Meteorological Service at R.A.F. Station Duxford,
flying "Met" sorties in conditions much worse than this.
Still, Camm's airplane, only some two hundred feet distant, was
little more than an irregular shadow in the rain-streaked, pre-dawn
gloom. Today's mission did not promise an easy ride.
Twist pulled on thin leather flying gloves and tucked them in
at the palms of his hands. He wondered idly if they-like his flying
helmet, jacket, and boots-had been taken from a live German who
had managed to parachute or crash land on British soil, or whether
they had been peeled from a dead body. He'd been perfectly outfitted
with a Luftwaffe uniform, complete with identification tags naming
him Hans Scheckter, an Oberleutnant. His flight suit bore two
large patches, expertly applied, near the center of the chest;
he'd asked no questions about them, and no explanations had been
offered.
The handling crew swung his Messerschmitt in line behind the last
Spitfire, then two of them dodged beneath the wings to chock the
wheels. Another shone a flashlight forward along the dark line
of airplanes toward the control tower. Beside each Spitfire, ground
handlers huddled by their battery carts, waiting. Long moments
later, a green signal light gleamed three times from the distant
control tower. In spite of himself, Twist experienced a feeling
of excitement deep in his gut. This was the beginning: engine
start.
A brawny engine mechanic climbed onto the Messerschmitt's right wing root, turned to flash a smiling "thumbs up" through the Perspex, then inserted one end of a large crank into the fuselage just aft of airplane's single Daimler-Benz DB601E piston engine. "Ready, Mr. Twist?" he shouted over his shoulder as rain streamed from his slicker.
Twist scanned the area around the front of the airplane-empty. "Brakes set," he shouted in reply, bringing the stick all the way back and setting the parking brakes.
Immediately, the mechanic put his back into the crank. The starter flywheel began to spin up with a raspy screaming of gears.
Twist lifted the fuel cock and enabled the fuel pump, then grasped the handle of the primer, levering it up and down at least ten times to charge the twelve inverted cylinders with raw gasoline. He knew it was impossible to overprime the big 1,300 hp engine; he'd once primed it twenty times on a bet-the engine started immediately, and he'd won, to the tune of five quid.
When the shrill scream of gears reached a crescendo, he cracked the throttle slightly forward, lifted the ignition switch one notch to enable both magnetos, and pulled the starter handle, engaging a clutch that connected the flywheel with the engine. More than ten feet forward, the three-bladed VDM variable-pitch propeller began to swing clockwise at the end of the airplane's long nose. One . . . two . . . three slim blades passed in front of the windshield with a damp-sounding whump before a vivid, blue-orange flame suddenly belched from the left exhaust stack mounted low on the side of the engine. Then another flame-this from the right stack-and still another, rocking the little airplane on its delicate landing gear. The propeller blurred as all twelve cylinders began to bark thunderously, spewing clouds of exhaust smoke-whose acrid stench leaked in through every crack and cable opening in the cockpit-and the engine sorted itself into a brutal howl. He throttled back to a dry-sounding, uncertain rumble while the mechanic removed his crank and vaulted from the wing with a final thumbs-up.
All told, Twist had flown this particular Messerschmitt more than thirty hours and felt reasonably comfortable about it-if not affectionate. For the most part, its flying controls were similar to other fighters, old or new. Pushing or pulling the control column operated elevators to raise or lower the nose, while a sideways motion worked ailerons to rock the wings; foot pedals with straps to hold the feet in place moved the rudder. A trimming device-a wheel set to the left of the seat cushion-moved tabs on the elevators and enabled the pilot to fine tune the plane for level flight. A separate wheel outboard of the trim wheel raised and lowered the flaps to adjust the lift of the wings.
He switched on the instrument lights and carefully scanned the Messerschmitt's panel, one he considered logical and easy to follow in spite of its complete dependence on the bloody metric system. He'd studied the well-thought-out arrangement for nearly a week: much different from the familiar, but seemingly helter-skelter organization in Spitfires. Flight instruments: altimeter, compass, turn-and-bank, and airspeed indicators, all in metric units, were grouped in a protective anti shock panel beneath the front windshield. Engine readout dials-manifold pressure, tachometer, oil pressure, and the like-a radio, and landing-gear controls were clustered to the right and below. A transparent display plate for the reflector gun sight intruded a few inches into the right half of the center windshield.
Notably missing from the panel were such British standard flying aids as a gyrocompass and artificial horizon. Consequently, Bf 109s were ill equipped for operating in the instrument conditions that were predicted all the way to the target. It was the reason Twist would be forced to fly tucked in close formation behind the three Spitfires. Over the continent, they would use clouds for cover as did certain R.A.F. patrols flying dangerous "rhubarb" missions.
Only this rhubarb, at least in Twist's view, was surely the most bloody lunatic of them all-even though it had been his idea from the start.
He made a last-moment inventory of his map case, hand grenade, pistol, and survival pack, then checked the newly installed "Hollywood" handle beside his right foot-it moved freely. By the time he looked up through the rain-streaked windshield again, the Spitfires' engines were also running and the weather was at least moderating, as predicted by the Met's weather wizards. Shortly, an amber signal light gleamed from the control tower, and figures darted beneath his wings again, reappearing moments later with wheel chocks in tow. He donned his cold rubber oxygen mask, also authentically German, and started the flow of gas, scanning the engine instruments again; all were coming up nicely on normal readings. As he checked the altimeter-adjusted to QFE, or zero kilometers elevation, only minutes previously-the tower displayed a green signal light. Camm's Spitfire immediately started off toward the taxiway, followed after a pause by Beatty's. A moment later, Murphy moved out after them.
Messerschmitts were a bloody handfull on the ground. Twist allowed an interval of at least fifty feet before he gunned the Diamler-Benz, released the parking brake, and started for the taxiway. The R.A.F. did its best to make the lives of Luftwaffe pilots miserable, but little they could do was as bad as designer Willi Messerschmitt himself accomplished. With the airplane's nose pointed up at an angle, Twist's view forward was awful-worse even than in a Spitfire. He could see virtually nothing within thirty or forty degrees-to either side-of the nose. Differential application of individual toe brakes atop the rudder pedals swung the nose from side to side while he taxied, affording short glimpses ahead through the quarter panels beside the windshield. The maneuver called "S-ing" was standard practice in every airplane that used a tail wheel.
Following Murphy left onto the taxiway, he applied full left rudder, stamped on the toe brake, then pushed the stick fully forward. "Turn, Goddamnit!" he grumbled, as the Messerschmitt grudgingly swung to the left. It was a maneuver totally foreign to Spitfire drivers like himself, but the technique made his tail-heavy German fighter plane at least minimally compliant with his directional wishes.
While he "S-ed" his way in column with the three Spitfires toward the south end of the runway, Twist's eye caught a small Humber staff car passing in his same direction, lights extinguished, along the parallel access road. The whole airdrome was closed for normal traffic until the four planes were safely away, so he had little trouble guessing who was at the wheel.
When the Humber drew to a halt
facing the runway, he took a deep breath and shook his head ruefully.
With all the other lunacy going on in the world, he considered
somewhat wretchedly, he never should have let himself become involved-with
anyone. Especially with someone quite so maddeningly appealing
as Sylvia Baxter . . . .
At the end of the taxiway, the planes stopped and swung into the
wind for magneto checks and a final engine runup. Twist stood
on the toe brakes, easing the throttle forward until the Diamler-Benz
was bellowing at 2,600 r.p.m.-a full 1.3 atmosphere reading on
his manifold pressure gauge . . . good. Switching to left magneto
alone, he saw only a one-hundred fifty r.p.ms loss . . . normal.
On the right however: the drop was nearly three hundred.
Bad news!
The reading was barely marginal-after
perfectly normal operation earlier in the day. Magnetos were like
that. He frowned, idly toying with the safetied gun button on
the control stick-the ammunition boxes were only loaded with blank
cartridges in any event. Should he abort? Things had come awfully
far to cancel the mission over a weak magneto, especially when
the primary one was operating so well. Besides, as a test pilot,
he had become quite accustomed to nursing airplanes that were
not a hundred percent operational. Sure he'd make it!
Well, . . .almost sure.
Shrugging off a moment's anxiety, he repositioned the lever to use both magnetos, then retarded the throttle to a high idle and waited, the faces of Operation Pinch passing before his mind's eye: Baxter, Hoyt-Anderson, Baptiste, Dunham, McCade, Johnson, Varese, Gagnaire and the other Frenchmen-even Barrackman. God, what a bloody, bloody waste it had been, he thought with a shudder. All the death and grief . . . .
Presently, above the noise of his idling Diamler-Benz, he heard the distinctive muffled howl of Rolls-Royce engines being throttled up; Camm and Beatty were taxiing onto the short, north-south runway. They came to a stop side by side on the concrete, pointing directly into the south wind. With a glance over his right shoulder, Twist saw the tower's green "GO" light flicker through his tiny rear quarter window. The pair started their takeoff almost as soon as it appeared, exhausts flaring vividly in the gloom. Scant moments later, the airplanes faded to ghosts behind clouds of spray, then briefly reappeared in the distance, climbing through the gray rain, their landing gear retracting awkwardly outward before both disappeared abruptly into the low clouds.
For a moment, Twist glanced back at the Humber. In the lightening murk, he saw two figures now standing beside it-both clearly feminine, even in rain gear. The smaller was waving hesitantly.
Shrugging, he waved back as much as he was able in the cramped cockpit, though he was certain she wouldn't be able to see. Perhaps afterward, he thought, . . . if he were to have an afterward. Not worth thinking about at this particular juncture. Resolutely, he coerced the Messerschmitt onto the runway and pulled up beside Murphy's Spitfire. From now on, he had time only for reactions and flying.
He moved the trim wheel nose-up one notch, lowered the flaps to 20 degrees, locked the tail wheel straight fore and aft, raised the propeller pitch to coarse, and stood on the toe brakes again as he brought the Diamler-Benz to takeoff power at 1.1 atmospheres on the manifold pressure gauge.
Releasing his brakes a split second after Murphy, he started down the runway, wheels bumping and rumbling over the wet grass. His entire existence was now focused on getting the skittish little airplane off the ground in one piece--a difficult task indeed. Holding his breath, he fed in left rudder to counter a gyroscopic tendency to swing right with the propeller. From unhappy experience, he knew that if he allowed any swing at all, the Messerschmitt's directionally unstable landing gears would quickly begin a turn about the outside wheel, leading to a classic ground loop and disaster, at least for this mission. The problem was accentuated because the forward view was so poor that it was difficult to detect a swing starting. The airplane's only saving grace was its lockable tail wheel, so he kept that on the ground until he could accelerate to flying speed, which was approaching rapidly.
He felt himself pushed firmly into the seat back as airspeed rose to one hundred kilometers per hour . . . one ten . . . one twenty . . . one forty five . . . . Gentle forward pressure on the stick lifted the tail just clear of the runway. The plane instantly attempted to veer; he caught it with the rudder. Then, with slight back pressure on the stick, the Messerschmitt lifted off smoothly as the air speed needle went through one fifty kph. With one eye on the instruments and the other on Murphy's Spitfire, he raised the flaps, then retracted the landing gear as he climbed through stormy turbulence toward the low clouds.
Operation Pinch had failed. Perhaps today's effort would do the trick.
