Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 3, 2018 18:47:15 GMT 12
Here's another interesting and quite different experience of an RNZAF pilot and his crew. Apologies for the language, it is of its time. From the NZ Herald dated 12 March 1943.
ORDEAL IN AFRICA
NEW ZEALAND AIRMAN
DOWN AMONG BLACKS
INTERNED IN SENEGAL
(Special Correspondent) (Recd. 5.35 p.m.) LONDON, March 10
Fourteen hundred miles out from Gibraltar on a flight to Bathurst, West Africa, last July, Flight-Sergeant E. G. Rhodes, of Pukeatua, Waikato, suddenly heard the steady purr of his Hudson's engines begin to jar. That change of note was to mean six months in an internment camp on the banks of the River Niger for him and his Sydney navigator and two English wireless operator air-gunners.
Flight-Sergeant Rhodes checked up and found that the starboard oil pump was out of action. He had to cut out the engine and then do some quick thinking, for the heavily-laden Hudson began to descend rapidly toward the sea. He immediately turned in toward the African coast and jettisoned 300 gallons of petrol to help lighten the aircraft and keep it flying. With 130 gallons of petrol left, he decided to attempt to reach Bathurst and by-pass Dakar in preference to going to St. Louis or making a forced landing in the desert.
Surrounded by Natives
Soon the Hudson was flying low over the desert and it was touch and go whether it could keep in the air on one engine, but Flight-Sergeant Rhodes, although he already had been flying for 12 hours, hung on patiently. Then the desert began to turn to malaria swampland. Then the roar of the heavily-overloaded port engine suddenly stopped. It had cut out and the pilot had to decide where he was going to make a forced landing. He sighted a sandbank between mangroves. With the undercarriage retracted he made a perfect landing, so that the members of the crew were not even bruised.
For a few moments the crew heard nothing but the hot engine sizzling in the water. Then the Australian navigator called out: "There is a horde of blacks coming." Flight-Sergeant Rhodes looked out and saw the natives dashing up waving hatchets. They clustered round the aircraft. He got out and stood on top of the fuselage and tried to talk to them in French and English without result.
The natives seemed friendly, in spite of their weapons. They jabbered excitedly while the crew collected the navigator's compass, water and iron rations and Flight-Sergeant Rhodes detonated secret instruments and set fire to the Hudson.
Escape Attempt Fails
Soon a swarm of canoes collected and the airmen were taken to a village. Weary after their long flight and bemused by the heat and the babble of the natives, they were rather dazed and did not appreciate the reception at the village, where natives shouted, danced, jumped and ran round them, intending to be helpful, but only getting in the way and adding to the confusion. Flight-Sergeant Rhodes tried to buy a canoe in order to make off and escape from the French, who he guessed probably would arrive shortly, but the natives had no intention of letting them go, as a messenger already had returned from a French camp with a promise of 1000 francs for each member of the crew if held until the French arrived.
The airmen were given a hut and at midnight, when the excitement had died down and the natives slept, Flight-Sergeant Rhodes crept out and, under bright moonlight, selected a canoe for their escape. He was returning to the hut for his companions when he saw French soldiers. That was the end of hopes for escape.
The French treated them politely and firmly and took them by launch to a small township, where the residents sent them two bottles of gin. They were taken to Kaolack, on the River Sal, in Senegal, where they remained for a fortnight.
Snakes and Fever
The French tried devious ways to extract information from the airmen, once starting a conversation over a bottle of champagne. There followed a 42-hour train journey in a guard's van with four black guards to Koulikoro, on the River Niger. They were taken to an internment camp, where for six months they lived uncomfortably. Sometimes they had fever and sometimes they found snakes in their rooms and killed them. The food was poor, but the French were poorly provided themselves.
The airmen had no letters from home and no radio, but Flight-Sergeant Rhodes heard that two other New Zealanders were interned at Bamako, also on the Niger. He wrote to them. They were Flying-Officers Rex Mcllraith (Lower Hutt) and Cecil Todd (Palmerston North). These officers had been attacked by French fighters when flying a Wellington bomber 40 miles out at sea past Dakar, thereby complying with the international regulations. The French attack resulted in their making a forced landing on the shore. Flight-Sergeant Rhodes eventually met them in Gambia after the British and American landing in North Africa. They all went to England in the same ship and are now on leave in London with definite opinions about snakes, fever and the tropics.
ORDEAL IN AFRICA
NEW ZEALAND AIRMAN
DOWN AMONG BLACKS
INTERNED IN SENEGAL
(Special Correspondent) (Recd. 5.35 p.m.) LONDON, March 10
Fourteen hundred miles out from Gibraltar on a flight to Bathurst, West Africa, last July, Flight-Sergeant E. G. Rhodes, of Pukeatua, Waikato, suddenly heard the steady purr of his Hudson's engines begin to jar. That change of note was to mean six months in an internment camp on the banks of the River Niger for him and his Sydney navigator and two English wireless operator air-gunners.
Flight-Sergeant Rhodes checked up and found that the starboard oil pump was out of action. He had to cut out the engine and then do some quick thinking, for the heavily-laden Hudson began to descend rapidly toward the sea. He immediately turned in toward the African coast and jettisoned 300 gallons of petrol to help lighten the aircraft and keep it flying. With 130 gallons of petrol left, he decided to attempt to reach Bathurst and by-pass Dakar in preference to going to St. Louis or making a forced landing in the desert.
Surrounded by Natives
Soon the Hudson was flying low over the desert and it was touch and go whether it could keep in the air on one engine, but Flight-Sergeant Rhodes, although he already had been flying for 12 hours, hung on patiently. Then the desert began to turn to malaria swampland. Then the roar of the heavily-overloaded port engine suddenly stopped. It had cut out and the pilot had to decide where he was going to make a forced landing. He sighted a sandbank between mangroves. With the undercarriage retracted he made a perfect landing, so that the members of the crew were not even bruised.
For a few moments the crew heard nothing but the hot engine sizzling in the water. Then the Australian navigator called out: "There is a horde of blacks coming." Flight-Sergeant Rhodes looked out and saw the natives dashing up waving hatchets. They clustered round the aircraft. He got out and stood on top of the fuselage and tried to talk to them in French and English without result.
The natives seemed friendly, in spite of their weapons. They jabbered excitedly while the crew collected the navigator's compass, water and iron rations and Flight-Sergeant Rhodes detonated secret instruments and set fire to the Hudson.
Escape Attempt Fails
Soon a swarm of canoes collected and the airmen were taken to a village. Weary after their long flight and bemused by the heat and the babble of the natives, they were rather dazed and did not appreciate the reception at the village, where natives shouted, danced, jumped and ran round them, intending to be helpful, but only getting in the way and adding to the confusion. Flight-Sergeant Rhodes tried to buy a canoe in order to make off and escape from the French, who he guessed probably would arrive shortly, but the natives had no intention of letting them go, as a messenger already had returned from a French camp with a promise of 1000 francs for each member of the crew if held until the French arrived.
The airmen were given a hut and at midnight, when the excitement had died down and the natives slept, Flight-Sergeant Rhodes crept out and, under bright moonlight, selected a canoe for their escape. He was returning to the hut for his companions when he saw French soldiers. That was the end of hopes for escape.
The French treated them politely and firmly and took them by launch to a small township, where the residents sent them two bottles of gin. They were taken to Kaolack, on the River Sal, in Senegal, where they remained for a fortnight.
Snakes and Fever
The French tried devious ways to extract information from the airmen, once starting a conversation over a bottle of champagne. There followed a 42-hour train journey in a guard's van with four black guards to Koulikoro, on the River Niger. They were taken to an internment camp, where for six months they lived uncomfortably. Sometimes they had fever and sometimes they found snakes in their rooms and killed them. The food was poor, but the French were poorly provided themselves.
The airmen had no letters from home and no radio, but Flight-Sergeant Rhodes heard that two other New Zealanders were interned at Bamako, also on the Niger. He wrote to them. They were Flying-Officers Rex Mcllraith (Lower Hutt) and Cecil Todd (Palmerston North). These officers had been attacked by French fighters when flying a Wellington bomber 40 miles out at sea past Dakar, thereby complying with the international regulations. The French attack resulted in their making a forced landing on the shore. Flight-Sergeant Rhodes eventually met them in Gambia after the British and American landing in North Africa. They all went to England in the same ship and are now on leave in London with definite opinions about snakes, fever and the tropics.
