Side views of 49 & 576 Squadron lancasters, courtesy of Malcolm Barrass, Air of Authority.

This was the aircraft used by the crews of 49 and 576 squadrons whilst operating from Fiskerton. Designed by Roy Chadwick and built by Avro, this superbly robust and reliable aircraft was developed from the disasterous two-engined Manchester and was introduced into service in 1942. It was calculated at the time that this aircraft could inflict more damage on the enemy that any other weapon produced by the same expenditure of man-hours and materials. With a crew of seven comprising: Pilot, Flight Engineer, Navigator, Radio Operator,Bomb Aimer/Front Gunner, Mid-upper Gunner and Rear Gunner it was powered by four of the equally superb and proven Merlin engines this 'plane was able to carry heavy bombloads over great distances to targets deep in Germany at a very respectable speed.Flights could last a nerveracking eight-hours. This aircraft, together with its highly trained and professional young crews, was the ideal tool for carrying the fight to the enemy at a time when the war was not going well for us anywhere else.

Of flying the Lancaster, Flt./Lt. H.H.M. Cave, a pilot with 419 Sqn in 1944-45 said the following: "The Lancaster was the finest aircraft I have ever flown. It was like flying a Tiger Moth except that it had four engines. It just floated like a bird and it didn't want to land! It was as if it just loved to fly. It was responsive to the controls-just a little touch to bank, climb or dive. just a slight movement and it performed beautifully and smoothly. The pilot has fantastic visibility, you could see everything. It was like being in a greenhouse. I could look around and if I adjusted my seat to its highest and shortened the rudder pedals to their fullest extent I could see through 360 degrees.I could see right through the astro-dome and the mid-upper turret.I had never flown this aircraft before so I went out with another pilot from the Squadron. He did one circuit and landing, stepped out of the aircraft and I took it from there. (Many thanks to Jim Cave for allowing me to  use this text.)

 A total of 7,377 were built, both here in the UK and in Canada. The Castle Bromwich factory alone employed 12,000 people on Lancaster production. Fifty-nine  squadrons operated the aircraft, flying some 156,000 sorties. This was not without its price and losses were high. Facing nightly, appalling dangers and hardships which we today would not even contemplate taking and facing the prospect of a horrible death  trapped in a burning Lancaster or falling thousands of feet, not having had time to don a parachute  as their lancaster broke up in mid-air. Many more would die in accidents, training accidents on obsolete aircraft alone accounted for 15% of Bomber Command's losses.Many died returning to their  bases tired, after a long flight or with damaged aircraft and wounded crew. Mid-air collisions, bad weather, crash landings in fog or simply by becoming lost,eventually running out of fuel and drowning in the dark freezing waters of the North Sea would all take their toll. A lancaster and its crew were only expected to survive on ops for just three-weeks and the odds against completing the mandatory tour of 30 operations over enemy territory were very slim. A crew would fly one night, return home safely and then be lost the next night. Lancasters returned nightly with dead crew members aboard. Luck played a huge part. It was said, that whilst waiting in the crew rooms for the transport out to the aircraft, a person could have a certain look about him as if he knew  somwhow he might not get back. Very often, that person failed to return and had got the "Chop". Some of these raids, specially the long-distance targets like Berlin, seem almost suicidal but the courageous young men who made up the crews, undertook these raids  with great determination. Of the total number of Lancs built, just under half had been lost by the end of the war. In just one month alone, during the campaign, when the losses were at their highest, of 16 crews based at Fiskerton, 3 completed their tours of 30 operations, 1 crew were listed as Prisoners of War, another crew were listed as Killed in Action and the remainder, a staggering 10 crews were listed as "Failed to Return." A loss rate of over 80%. For all the Lancaster's good points, it had one fatal flaw- it was extremely difficult to escape from in an emergency. Confined spaces and bulky cold-weather flying gear made it almost impossible to get out of a plummeting Lanc.

If operational flying was bad, life on the ground wasn't much better. The ever-present thought that tomorrow you might be gone. Also, living condtions on the built-for-war airfields were almost intolerable. Tin-hut accommodation, freezing cold in winter, baking hot in summer and sometimes miles from the mess and the washrooms. The aircrew took pills to keep them awake and pills to make them sleep.

And when it was all over, some stayed in the R.A.F. Some distinguished themselves outside of the R.A.F but most went back to the routine of civilian life. How strange it must have been for former aircrew after their wartime life. Many would suffer physical and emotional pain for the rest of their lives. Over the years, many would re-visit their former bases but some would not. A veteran I spoke to, said that even after all these years he still went outside at night and stood looking up into the night sky thinking about what happened all those years ago.

In a book i have, called:"Lancaster The Story of A Famous Bomber" the serial numbers of every Lancaster produced is listed together with its fate. Many are listed as lost with the target and date. Many others are simply listed as missing. Another seven young men who vanished without trace. At the end of hostilities,most of the Lancasters which has survived the war were simply, without thought or regret broken up for scrap. See also this link for Lancaster fates as listed by serial number.   http://lancaster-archive.com/lanc_main_page.htm

Lancasters operating from this airfield were involved in many important raids during the bombing campaign. These include: the shuttle raids, targets in the heavily defended Rhur valley, the Battle of Berlin, the daring 49 Squadron-led raid on the Schneider works at Le Creusot, the vitally important and top secret raid on the V rocket development site at Peenemunde and the last raid of the war: the SS barracks at the die-hard Nazi stronghold- Bertchesgarden. Immediately following the end of hostilities, 576 Squadron was involved in repatriating former alies P.O.W's and Operation Manna- the arial supply of food to starving Dutch and other civilians in war-ravaged Europe.

THE ROLL of THE GROUNDCREWS.

Each Lancaster had a ground crew. This was made up of skilled craftsmen who serviced and repaired the lancasters. Given the nature of the tasks the Lancasters were having to perform, this must have been an incredibly difficult job. Working around the clock at the lonely dispersal points, in all weathers, perched high above the ground toiling to get their Lancaster ready for the night's operation and doing everything possible to ensure that no fault could occur which would endanger the safety of their flight crew. But hardest of all, how they must have felt after waiting for hours for "their" Lanc to return and then the sad realisation that it would not be coming back to the now lonely dispersal. Another seven faces which would never  be seen again but also never forgotten.

For anyone interested in learning about the Lancaster and the bombing campaign, there is a wealth of information on the subject which can be found on the internet. (See Links page on this website for a growing number of links to similar sites.) Another equally good way is through books on the subject. Local libraries stock many books. One such series of books is called: "The Lancaster At War" series. This excellent  collection of books has thousands of images taken at the time on operational airfields, Fiskerton included, together with  detailed accounts and stories by the persons who actually took part at the time.

Of the  personal and factual/historical stories of Bomber Command, there are thousands. Stories of astonishing selfless bravery, pilots remaining at the controls of burning aircraft to give their crews a chance to bail out, knowing they themselves would not survive. Stories of incredible devotion to duty, of veteran crews who had completed their tour of ops but volunteered,(all aircrew were volunteers,) for a second.Individuals who offered to help with a crew shortage-many paying the ultimate price for their heroism. Senior officers who led by example and flew when not always required to. And the tragic stories: crews who were lost on their final mission of the tour. Crews who were lost on their first mission of the tour, some crews did not even had time to unpack their kit before being posted as missing. And stories of incredible luck: crews who flew their tour and never even saw a night fighter, never fired a shot in anger  and every op was routine and uneventful. 

The Commander-in-Chief of Bomber Command at the time, Air Marshall Arthur "Bomber" Harris  had spent the years between the wars developing the theory of bombing. Now it was his chance to try them out. A wartime pilot himself, he had personally seen the horror and slaughter of trench warfare in the First World War . He believed he could prevent a re-occurance of this through the systematic bombing of the enemy. He believed through this, the will to continue the fight would collapse and if an enemy could be bombed enough and if  their moral could be destroyed, they would rebel against their leaders, in this case the Nazis. This would  bring an early end to the war without the need of a D-day landing and the loss of Allied lives that this would incur. Unfortunately,this did not happen as Harris, along with everyone else,  had seriously  underestimated just how enduring and fanatical the Nazis and the German people were.

By bombing  German targets, us by night and later the Americans by day  kept the Nazis on the defensive for over four-years. It destroyed and disrupted their war- manufacturing facilities and forced the enemy to use up precious resources that would have been used offensively against us, on and after D-Day.  There can be little doubt that  the bombing campaign helped to bring about our eventual victory in W.W.2. 

Later, after D Day, the Nazi military leaders knew they could not possibly win the war. They could have put an end to the bombing at any time by simply  giving up the fight. But instead, they did everything possible to prolong the war and were busy planning counter attacks and developing  weapons of mass destruction. The V1 & 2's were already raining down on London. The race was on to develop atomic capability. Rockets and atomic energy: this combination would have been the end of this country and it would have been used against us without any hesitation or mercy. It was only a matter of when the atomic bombs would start raining down on us.  Who knows how close this came to being reality. The Nazis elected to start a total war and we were forced to do the same. They chose to prolong the war and fight to the very end and the bombing campaign continued to the very end. Because of this, many thousands of innocent civilians,  on sides of the North Sea and allied servicemen lost their lives unnecessarily.

In the closing stages of the war our bombing,  together with the Allied and Soviet ground force advance on Berlin, had devestating effects  on  the German civil population. Dragged into a war that they did not want, wishing like us only to live their lives in peace. Bombing targets were selected for their  industrial, military and  stratigic values. Unfortunately, these targets were often situated close to heavily populated urban area and casualties were high.  Others raids, such as the ones mounted against the eastern cities of Chemnitz, Dresden and Leipzig  which were attacked late in the war,  were    carried out using Soviet army intelligence and were designed to cause as much disruption and chaos as possible-therefore  assisting the  Russian forces which were advancing from the east in the face of stiff resistance and suffering heavy casualties.  THESE ARE THE FACTS.