A PERSONAL VIEW OF W.W.II
By
F.O. Franklin Keith Nevills R.C.A.F. J14860 (Ret'd)
(Non-com #R66330)
Transcribed by sons Daniel and Douglas Nevills

    As a kid, I built model airplanes and dreamed of flying. My personal heroes were Dr. Jackson, a dentist in my hometown of Dunnville, Ontario, and Harold "Red" Lymburner, who lived on the next street. Dr. Jackson had flown SE-5's in World War I, and "Red" was a pilot on two Antarctic expeditions, in 1935 and 1938.

    In August of 1939, before the war started, a recruiting depot opened in Niagara Falls. I was 18 years old. I borrowed a car and down I went. I didn't weigh enough, so I was told to eat 6 bananas when I returned the next week. It worked and I was sworn in.

    I wasn't called up until November 11, 1940. We were trucked from Niagara Falls to Hamilton and put on a train to the Canadian National Exhibition grounds in Toronto. Number 1 Manning Depot was next to the Cow Palace. I did guard duty in St. Thomas, where the Air Force had taken over a mental hospital and made it a school for fitters and riggers. Then I went to #1 I.T.S. at the Eglinton Hunt Club in Toronto. There I suffered the saddest day in my young life--- I washed out as a pilot! It was back to Manning Depot with lA Squadron, "The Washouts", where I learned to march again.

    When they decided that I could march well enough, I was posted to # 1 Air Observer School at Malton Ontario. It is fun to pass through Pearson International Airport in Toronto today and think of what it was like in 1941. I was good in math and science and I enjoyed the instruction on the twin engine Avro Anson aircraft.

    Then I went to #1 Bombing and Gunnery School at Jarvis Ontario. We were instructed in the Fairy Battle aircraft. They had been crated and shipped straight from combat! They had bullet holes and shrapnel holes and mud and blood. It was a rude awakening for us, who had never seen anyone else's blood before. On September 27, 1941 I was awarded my Observer Wing. After the ceremony we boarded a train for Pennfield Ridge, New Brunswick, the site of #2 Air Navigation School. Pennfield was cut right out of the bush. When we took off at night, a truck would race down the runway ahead of us to make sure there were no moose or bears in our way!

    On November 13, 1941 we sailed from Halifax, Nova Scotia on the H.M.T. Warwick Castle. We were escorted by the United States Navy, who had been secretly helping England before the United States declared war. We landed in Gourock Scotland and took a train to Bournemouth Holding Unit. I was sent to Limavady, Northern Ireland. Royal Air Force Squadron #53 was reforming after severe losses. The remaining crews of 2 pilots and 2 Wireless Air Gunners were split up, a Navigator and a W.A.G. were added to make 2 crews from 1 former crew. I wound up with an Australian pilot and 2 R.A.F. W.A.G.'s.

    We flew a few training missions, including night "Circuits and Bumps" for my pilot to get his Night Flying Confirmation. Then we flew sweeps and we flew cover over the convoy bringing the first American troops to the European Theatre.

    Then 53 Squadron was moved to North Coates, England where we started flying operations right away. We were flying cover on our coastal convoys and doing sweeps over the North Sea, and sweeps over the northern coasts of Holland and Germany, inside of Frisian Islands. We were looking for German coastal shipping. We also hit German convoys taking troops and supplies to Norway for the occupying German forces. We also went through the Skagerrak to the Inner German Waters to hit Hamburg and shipping on the so-called "German Only Waters" off the coast of Sweden.

    During these days one very serious problem was "friendly fire", but I don't think the phrase had been coined yet. The Royal Navy vessels fired at anything that moved. I'm sure they even fired at sea gulls!

    When we were at North Coates; it was a large rectangle of rolling grass, no runways, we would taxi out until we could line up for the longest take off run. There weren't many rules followed. Sometimes we would be 3 or 4 aircraft, wingtip to wingtip taking off together so we wouldn't waste fuel circling to get into formation for the trip.

    On February 26, 1942, between Helgoland and the coast of Denmark, 5 of us were flying in corridors making an offensive sweep from south to north. Our crew located a German convoy. There were 5 merchant ships and at least 15 flak ships sailing north. We radioed the other 4 aircraft from our squadron and we all attacked. We were badly shot up by 2O mm. and 4O mm. shells but managed to reach Docking in East Anglia where we crashed. My legs were banged up and cut with fine shrapnel but nothing serious enough to go on my record. When you are 21, you heal quickly and you don't think that you will suffer in the future. Considering the large number of flak ships, Intelligence felt that it was a supply convoy headed to Norway.

    One day, at early dawn, we came upon a German submarine just starting to dive. We dropped our 6 depth charges in front of it. The last one hit the conning tower and rolled off. We never had a confirmation of it sinking.

    After only 3 months in North Coates, we were back in Limavady reforming the squadron again! Our crew was one of the most senior of the Squadron by the middle of March. The new crews were disappearing so fast, you hardly got to know them. They arrived and then they were gone.

    After the squadron reformed I was in the hospital with infected sinuses. While I was in hospital my skipper and crew mates flew to the U.S.A. Our squadron had been fitted with the latest radar (360 deg. Coverage). The complete Squadron - planes, air crews, ground crews and all the equipment to maintain an operational squadron went to the United States to show this new radar to the U.S. Navy. As soon as I was well enough I was put on a ship and sent to North America. I rejoined the Squadron at Quonset Point Naval Air Station, Rhode Island U.S.A.

    We were supposed to show off our new radar to the U.S. Navy all along the East Coast of the States. However there was a new development in the war. German submarines were having a ball sinking freighters loaded with bauxite from South America. This bauxite was used to make aluminum, which of course, is used to make airplanes. We were all moved to Trinidad.

    On the way we made antisubmarine sweeps. We were landing in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for fuel but we had been given the wrong radio frequency. We had no communication with the ground so we had to choose our own runway. Unfortunately, the skipper chose the wrong one. It was nice and new, but short - with a 60 ft. drop at the end. When he saw that we were running out of runway, he tried to ground loop the aircraft to port. The oleo legs (landing gear) just snapped and we went over the end on the belly, starboard wingtip first. It soon dug in and we swung up and hovered on that wingtip for a moment, (which seemed like an eternity) before we fell back against the slope of the fill of the runway. We couldn't get out until Cuban workmen pried the door open with a pickaxe! Once again I ended up with only bruises, scrapes and sprains. Thankfully there was no fire. Any landing that you walk away from is a good landing.

    Twelve days later it happened for the third time. With a South African skipper, we were landing at Waller Field in Trinidad. There was only one runway and we landed in a tropical storm. The runway was wet and slippery, with a strong starboard to port cross wind. We slid off. The runoff from so many heavy rains had caused deep ruts along the shoulder of the runway. The port wheel caught in a rut, the oleo leg snapped and we cart wheeled into a concrete air raid shelter. The nose of the plane was crushed right back to the cockpit. I walked away again. It was a crazy place to build an air raid shelter.

    While operating from Trinidad, along the northern coast of South America, we flew over the famous French penal colony at Devil's Island. At different times we refuelled at Georgetown in British Guiana and at Paramaribo in Dutch Guiana. Trinidad was hot and humid with deadly snakes and spiders. A hell of a place!

    See Note [1]

    We were supposed to return to the U. K. by flying across the Atlantic in a B-25 Mitchell aircraft. We were taking off from Holton, Maine when I looked out the window and saw molten metal running from the port engine nacelle. My space was filling up with smoke. I managed to reach up and hit the pilot. He turned, saw the smoke, put the under-carriage down again, made one circle and landed. As we slowed down, I dropped out of the entry hatch onto the tarmac. My pilot did the same. We walked away. An inspection revealed that a crack in the exhaust manifold was blowing hot exhaust onto the bulkhead behind the engine and melting it. There is a fuel tank behind that bulkhead. This might explain the disappearance of some aircraft. After that, all B-25's were grounded until fitted with a redesigned exhaust system.

    We were then flown to Dorval, Quebec where we picked up a Hudson and flew it to Labrador, and on to Greenland. In Greenland, an aircraft taxiing by caught the nose of our parked Hudson and crushed it in. All of the windows were broken. We knew that parts would have to be ordered all the way from Lockheed in California. We would be stuck in Greenland for weeks. Since I was the only one in our crew that sounded anything like a "Yank", I was elected to cover my lowly Sergeant stripes with my flying jacket and enter the Officer's Mess. I bought two 20-can cases of beer for $2 a case and we bribed a rigger to scrounge for parts from damaged aircraft. He managed to get all the windows we needed, but no nose cone. So he put a flat piece of aluminium across the opening of the nose and strengthened it with 2"X 6"'s on the inside. When we landed in Iceland we parked as far from the control tower as we could so as not to be seen and be grounded! We fishtailed all the way to Prestwick, Scotland. Again we parked as far away as possible, and ran for the train station. That was my last trip with 53 Squadron.

    I was sent to an Operational Training Unit in Killadeas, Northern Ireland as a Navigation Instructor flying in Catalina's. Here I applied for my commission and after a time I became a Pilot Officer. I was immediately posted to Alness, Scotland, as a Navigation Instructor flying in Sunderlands. After a few months I was on my way home to Canada, on 30 days leave.

    See Note [2]

    After my 30 days leave, I joined 407 R.C.A.F. "The Demons" Squadron, in Limavady, Northern Ireland. We had Wellingtons, equipped with a retractable 25 million candle-power search light and 2 over-load fuel tanks. We could stay in the air for almost 13 hours. We flew mostly from Wick, in northern Scotland and often refuelled in Murmansk, northern Russia flying along the coast of Norway and around the coast to the north coast of Russia. We also refuelled at Stornoway, Lewis Island, the Outer Hebrides Islands.

Keith - 407 Squadron – Limivady

    I was in air when when Peace was declared. The pilot, flying low, would throttle back a bit as we flew over villages, and we could hear the church bells ringing! What a glorious sound it was. Unforgettable.

    During the war I crossed the Atlantic 6 times, 5 times by ocean liner and once in a battered-up Hudson. I am sure I flew with a Special Protector, 57 missions with 53 Squadron and 30 missions with the 407 Squadron. I feel very fortunate to be here.

SOURCE: An autobiography of F/O F. Keith Nevills that he wrote on 03 August 2004 to recite for the Airmen’s Association in Halifax, Nova Scotia as an initiation for his membership. His sons Dan and Doug have edited and expanded it slightly using notes from his journals and logs.

TRANSCRIBER NOTATIONS:

My brother, Dan, & I thought that these two events were just too significant to be left out of this story.

Note [1]: During this movement of 53 Squadron back to England, Dad and his crew stayed at Quonset Naval Air Station in Rhode Island for a short time. The city of Providence was close by so they spent just about all of their off time there. On 20 November 1942 Dad met Anna Agnes Lane. On 02 December 1942 he proposed to her...she accepted.

Note [2]: During this leave Dad married Anna Agnes Lane on 27 December 1943, and they remained married for just shy of 50 years, until Mom passed away 15 September 1993.

SOURCE: Douglas Nevills - 3 September 2010.

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