Daylight bombing

Looking back on it now, it was a very interesting experience. We had these DH-9's that had, the later models that the Americans flew when they came into the war were the DH-9A, which had the Liberty engines which went into production in a big way in the United States. But we had a great big Siddeley Puma 6 cylinder engine, inline engine, of 210 horsepower and the airplane would fly and we could get it up to about ten to, on a very good day, twelve thousand feet maybe. We could carry two 115 pound bombs under the wings or one 230 pounder, which fit in under the fuselage and just ahead of the undercarriage or about eight 25 pounders. But that took a special attachment to the bomb rack on the bottom of the wings. That was our mission, daylight bombing, and we were concentrating mainly on the submarine pens which were up the canal into Oostend and at Oostend and then at Brugge, which is up quite a long canal from Zeebrugge. We’d go over there everyday and maybe twice a day sometimes. And then we had a variety of other targets - one or two German aerodromes and a big ammunition dump, which we were lucky enough to hit and it burnt for about 10 days. They couldn’t put the fire out. Also I was there when the Royal Navy did the bombardment and sunk the ship inside the mole, as it was called, which was the breakwater to guard the entrance to the canal at Oostend on the coast and block the submarines from getting in or out. And I think there were two or three of them trapped up inside and they couldn’t use it anymore for a submarine repair and maintenance base for the North Sea.