I was recently reminded of a childhood nursery rhyme Ten Green Bottles.
Ten green bottles standing on the wall
If one green bottle should accidentally fall
Then there will be nine green bottles standing on the wall.
It came to mind when I read about Nichol’s book on the Lancaster Aircraft in the BBC History magazine.
He tells of a Lancaster pilot flying over Germany when some flak ignited the flares in the bomb bay. He was surrounded by green. Green flames, green smoke and green light.
Thinking he was about to die he bravely counted to 30. It was how long it would take his crew to evacuate the plane and he needed to keep it going to ensure their survival.
Before he got to 19 there was an almighty explosion and he found himself flying through the air, the blast had catapulted him out of the plane. He landed with his parachute, but not his crew. in an interview he said “On the way down, all I could think about was my crew. I still think about them every night and what I could have done better“. Clearly he could not have done anymore than he did.
Of the 125,000 people who served in Bomber Command , just over 55,000 were killed, another 10,000 were shot down and 8,500 injured. Chances of be unscathed were around 40%.
Nevertheless, crew really loved their Lancaster. Pilots talked of its fighter like handling and ability to take a lot of punishment. Many felt that if is was not for it being a Lancaster, they would not be alive today.
Imagine then the production line of men and women rivet by rivet using the basic tools of the day to build an aeroplane with a 102 foot wingspan; no computer technology or automation to help with the 7,377 aircraft built.
The Green Bottles poem ends ” there will be no green bottle sitting on the wall” but the Lancaster has a better ending. There still two of the iconic heavy bombers that remain airworthy and 17 of the aircraft remain in complete form.
Aircrew came from all walks of life and Lettice Curtis was the first woman to fly one when she worked in the Air Transport Auxiliary delivering aircraft to the RAF. You can get a better insight to their experiences and lives in the book ‘Lancaster: The Forging of a Very British Legend written by John Nicol and published by Simon and Schuster.