Arnhem

With sixteen panniers of food⁶ in the back and a briefing beforehand that as much as possible had to get through, they took off five hours later than planned, delayed from the morning to the afternoon by mist over the airfields and low cloud blanketing the approaches to the Netherlands. Even when they got into the air there was 10/10 cloud and visibility was down to half a mile for most of the journey, which meant there was no fighter escort cover. The weather cleared a little as they and the other 162 planes in the supply fleet that day got nearer their target, but the tidy, tight formations that had set off from English air space were all over the place. On the run-in, at low level for greater accuracy despite heavy flak, it was going to be each plane for itself. Given the murky conditions, flying had to be on instruments and, on King’s instruction, KG374 dropped to 1,500 feet. Emerging through the last of the hazy cloud, the cockpit crew got a visual on the town of Nijmegen below, 10 miles south of Arnhem. ‘Spot on, Harry,’ called the pilot.

In the back, the four dispatchers belted on their safety straps and got ready to propel the containers along the length of the fuselage and out of the door, a riskier business than it sounded, involving strength, speed and precise timing, while a howling gale from the open hatch threatened to blow them away. There was also the flak, coming up fast and furious from the ground now while the plane itself dropped steadily lower every second, right into the cauldron. There were 7 miles to go to the drop point when the starboard wing was hit twice. Black smoke trailed from the engine, followed by flames. From the cockpit, Lord checked that everyone was okay. Then he asked how far it was to the drop zone. ‘Three minutes’ flying time,’ King told him. He could have pulled out of the stream and abandoned both the drop and the ship by baling out. Accepted opinion among experienced airmen later was that Lord would have been fully justified in doing so. But, aware, one presumes, of how badly needed these supplies were, he made his decision – they were so close he was going in. He told the crew to prepare to jump while he battled to keep the crippled plane, listing heavily to the right and losing height, upright and on course. He could see his target and, not needing King to guide him in, he sent the navigator to help the dispatchers.

King scrambled back to a scene of horror. The engine, glimpsed through a porthole, was an inferno, and the flames were licking along the wing towards the fuel tank. The green-for-go light was on and the dispatchers were frantically at work, unshackling the tied-down panniers and kicking them along a metal roller track towards the door. Bundled in pairs, the panniers should have rolled smoothly out, one after the other, but the first one stuck on the flak-damaged track. They would have to be moved by hand, physically pushed and shoved into position. The dispatchers threw off their parachute harnesses to free themselves up to move in the confined space of the fuselage. Heaving and shoving, with King at the door giving the panniers a last kick, they dispatched twelve. But then the red light was flicked on from the cockpit. They were past the DZ and had to stop. Two pairs of baskets were left, King told Lord over the intercom. The pilot took another momentous decision. He wasn’t going home with a quarter of his load of desperately needed supplies for the fighting men below still on board. He was going back in, he announced. He was not to know that the drop zone below that he had just resupplied was in enemy hands and, in reality, it was the Germans, not his own troops, that he was risking his life, his plane and his crew to feed.