almost continual deployment against the transport formations of the German air force from Peloponnese and Crete's east by day, but primarily by night.  The Germans, with the placid Junker Ju 52 had no chance against the superior night hunters, who were armed with four 20 mm cannons and six 7.7 mm MGs and a speed of approximately 500 km per hour. After disastrous losses the Germans had finally been withdrawnNow we, as clueless as we were, with the admittedly faster, but still far inferior He 111 were supposed to close the gap and bring this hopeless business to a different conclusion.

At our disposal was the Heinkel, a specially built model originally made for an invasion of England, with two bench seats opposite each other for eight to ten people instead of the bomb bayMoreover, the airplane was equipped with a rubber dingy that was placed as a package behind the bow cockpit under the sheet metal of the fuselage.  In an emergency, the pilot could operate a mechanism from his seat that opened a compressed bottle of air, whereby the rubber dingy was inflated within a few seconds; the cover separated in the fuselage at the predetermined breaking point and fell out of the hatch that had been created.  The dingy was connected to the fuselage with a security rope that would prevent the boat from drifting away at sea and could be cut easily.  On the floor of the boat were four constructible paddles, a rudder, a compass, a receptacle with emergency food: cookies, chocolate, some packets of “Dextro-Energen” (glucose), a few cans with beverages (including can openers) and a first aid kitHardly conceivable, the scenes that might play out and actually did play out during the free-for-all over one of the five places in the rubber dingy after an emergency splashdown on the return flight with a full airplane.

October 1, 1944 began with a surprise for me: my promotion to sergeant. Still under the impression of this honor, we took off at 19:35 from Athens-Kalamaki into the great adventure with a target of Heraklion harbor and airfield at Crete's North-coast and the antique harbor of Knossos situated only 5 km to the southeast, the sovereign seat of the legendary King Minos, setting of the stories of Theseus and Ariadne – the one with the famous thread - and thus the second treasure trove of childlike fantasies, that was admittedly now largely subdued by bitterly serious reality.

A beautiful Mediterranean autumn day extended an almost abstract picture of flawless beauty with a cloudless sky, a grand mountain-panorama dipped in pastel-like ocher and, before us, a sea wide in the shine of the evening sun, gleaming indefinitely.  The reality was quite something different!  We had no binding strategy in expectation of the British night-hunters that were lying in wait, neither for the flight-course, nor for the cruising altitudeEach pilot had to decide in for himself, whether to fly in an arc east of Rhodes, an obviously extended duration of flight, over the islands of the Cyclades, with Syros, Paros and Santorini.  Thus the decision was between flying for the longest possible amount of time in close proximity to the islands, or the direct route over the island Milos. Since the British Beaufighters were equipped already with radar, flying low, at about 5 to 10 meters altitude with calm sea conditions seemed hardly any risk, in order to remain below the radarThere were only strict instructions respecting the formation of the airplanes.  We were supposed to stay as far from each other as possible, preferably avoiding visibility, in order to exclude accidental friendly fire.

I decided on the course over the Cyclades and a low altitude after the flight over the island of Santorini.  At first, it appeared that we had a splendid flight in store for us, over a peaceful dreamy island panorama in the dusk over Odysseus' wide seaAfter approximately one hour of flight time, the clock showed 20:40.  This corresponds to a distance of approximately 320 km.  I suddenly noticed the silhouette of an airplane against the moon as it rose out of the sea.  It was slowly passing mine at a close distance on the starboard side, twin-engine, but evidently smaller and fast than our Heinkel and was clearly recognizable, equipped with its star motors instead of row-motors. It quickly became clear to me that we were not dealing with a He 111 here, although the radio operator, the one delegated for a few missions with the squadron and among other things the lieutenant responsible for the airplane-recognition-service of the air-news-troop, believed that that was "unequivocally" what he had identified.  In response to my pressing question of the further behavior of the object that had meanwhile disappeared from my view came the ominous answer: "Now it’s right behind us!"  At the same moment, the first streak of light swept over the right wing on the level of the fuel-tank, which immediately caught fire.  A second followed which accurately ripped open the left wing at nearly same place and also began to burn.  Then, the spook was goneThe Beaufighter had turned away under fire from our aircraft’s weapons, even though we were much too late.  Whether he was hit or not we could not tell.

Now both wings were ablaze behind the motors with eerie red-black flames. The airplane, so it seemed, could explode at any moment, but I was still able to steer.  And the motors were still performing sufficiently to climb 80 to 100 meters so that we could get our bearings and to keep the machine in the air for as long as possible because every minute in flight shortened the distance to Heraklion’s harbor, whose blinking beacons we had already seen from afar.

All of this lasted only few moments and then the dream of flying was all over.  I could only concentrate on “starving" out my airplane in the descent to get to the border, i.e. to reduce the landing and touchdown-speed, and attempt a gentle belly landing on the waterWith the splash of the fuselage, the air-screws and the disks of the bow-cockpit burstThe fire suddenly had gone out, but immediately the water began to come through the hole into the wreck gurgling and gargling and quickly rose into the entire fuselageThe rubber dingy mechanism had worked perfectly, and the men

Text Box: No 46 Squadron RFC and RAF
We Rise to Conquer