211595 Sqd/Ldr. Norman "Red" Armin DFCRoyal Air Force Pilot 57,139 & 608 Squadrons from:Lanchester My dad joined the RAF in 1942. He had red hair and a quick temper hence the nickname 'Red'. He was not the stereo typical RAF officer and got into numerous scrapes off duty. On the day he signed up the guy behind the desk slung the signing up forms at him and they landed on the floor. Typically he got down on the floor signed the forms and left. He detested arrogance and bad manners.
After a brief introduction to the Lewis machine gun at RAF Shoreham he saw his first action as an AC2 against German tip and run raiders coming in low level across the English Channel. The enemy bombers were so low they had to depress their guns to take aim. They also managed to shoot at each other across the airfield. They did manage to shoot one bomber down and it crash landed in the field next to the airfield. One airman streaked ahead of the rest and by the time they caught up he had bayoneted the emerging pilot who according to him had resisted arrest. The airman's brother had been killed at Dunkirk. The reality of war was never far away.
He completed his flying training in Canada On Tiger Moths and Avro Ansons and passed out as Pilot Officer. On his return to England he joined 57 Squadron flying Vickers Wellingtons. The Wellington could take a tremendous amount of punishment with its geodetic construction and fabric covering. It was a very heavy aircraft to fly. The controls had no power assistance. One night on a raid they were coned after the master searchlight locked on to then. My dad put the aircraft into a dive to evade the searchlights and it took him and his navigator their full combined force with their feet on the instrument panel to pull the aircraft out of the dive.
My dad completed his first tour of operations with 57 Squadron and then joined an OTU Operational Training Squadron at Wellesbourne for a 'rest' He always maintained that this was as dangerous as operational flying because the Wellingtons they used for training were clapped out. On one training flight he was called away and had to leave the student with the aircraft with the engines ticking over. The student failed to periodically open and shut the engines which meant there was a danger of them overheating. He frantically tried to signal from the other side of airfield to the student to open up the engines but to no avail. On getting back to the aircraft he raised merry hell with the student while opening and closing the throttles. On take off they had just retracted the undercarriage when one of the engines caught fire and had to be immediately shut down. Climbing a Wellington on one engine particularly a clapped out one was unheard of at the time. With much cursing the hapless student was given the task of putting out the fire then manually lowering the undercarriage with a lever because the dead engine powered the hydraulics. After what was later considered to be an outstanding piece of airmanship dad managed to land the aircraft in one piece. By then he was raging and in a typical temper got out of the cockpit walked along the wing and peed on the offending engine. Unknown to him a party of WAAF's had been on a visit to the control tower and had observed the entire event. Needless to say the Station CO after commending him for his airmanship gave him a right old earwigging.
On return to operations my dad joined the famous 139 Jamaica Squadron flying Mosquitoes. He loved the Mossie, no crew to worry about apart from the Navigator and they were so fast very few fighters could catch them. More importantly it kept him alive. As he was nearing the end of his second tour of operations he was asked to transfer to the newly re-formed 608 Squadron which needed some experienced crews to help bed the Squadron in. Most of the raids in 1944 were against Berlin and on his last raid he flew with a heavy head cold, came down too fast on his return and damaged his eardrums. This was the end of his flying career as he was grounded. His navigator was re-crewed and was killed over Berlin a few weeks later.
He ended the war in Rangoon running an operational admin unit for General Slim. He caught malaria and it had a marked effect on his health for many years after his return to civilian life.
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