Blenheim Boy: Book Review

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Five of out five!

For most British people, the Spitfire (and to a lesser degree the Hurricane, its less famous stablemate) is the most popular aircraft. It has the legendary status as being the airframe which saved the country during the Battle of Britain, with circumstantial evidence that it prevented Operation Sealion (Germany's planned land invasion) from becoming a reality.

For me however, my favourite aircraft is the Bristol Blenheim. I don't know why, maybe I worked with one in a previous life or something, but I personally find it a very pretty aircraft of which sadly only one remains. When it first entered service with the RAF it was one of the most advanced military aircraft in production, being of an all-metal design and featuring a retractable landing gear and a hydraulic turret - a more than capable warplane during the inter-war years when most fighters were still wooden biplanes. By time the war started however, Blenheim was hardly fit-for-purpose.

By 1940 when RAF crewmen began flying sorties in support of French and the British BEF, the aircraft proved fatally underwhelming in its role as a ground attack aircraft. Virtually defenceless and slow, entire squadrons were wiped out within a few months defending the Low Countries and Northern France.

Still, I still love this aircraft, and so hoping to learn more about this I recently purchased a book for mere pence from Amazon called Blenheim Boy, by Richard Passmore. I wasn't sure what to expect as I had never read a war biography before, so as usual when a book arrives by post, I flicked through to read a few excerpts to get a feel for how the book reads.

The book is a pleasant surprise, written from the perspective of NCO aircrew who were and still are, neglected of their honours in comparison with some of their more glamorous co-workers in the captain's seat. It starts in the preceding years before the outbreak of war and ends with his crew parachuting out of their Blenheim after an assault on a German airfield goes horribly awry.

Passmore paints a vivid depiction of his time in the RAF. From horrific training accidents to hilarious pranks on other squadrons - its hard not to visualise as you're reading along, yet it has a brilliantly easy to read pacing. The scenes he depicts of flying along in the ball turret in the pre-war summer of 1939, shirt-sleeves rolled up and surveying the rugged north Cornwall coasts are beautiful and haunting.

One scene seemed of particular interest to me which occured just after the fall of France had been announced. For a few uneasy weeks it was assumed that Germany would launch an almost immediate amphibious and airbourne attack on the south of England, that attack obviously never came, but Passmore's Group Captain made it clear to his unit that all of them, aircrew and groundcrew, would be expected to do their duty and give up their lives in the defence of their country:

“When it came, he told us, we could not possibly defend ourselves for long against the overwhelming forces that would be launched against us, but we would never surrender. Our one remaining task was to lay waste to our island and to sell our lives dearly.

At this stage he beckoned to his adjutant and the two conferred briefly over a thick pad of papers. So shocked and intense was the silence that nobody tried to utilise the pause for a quick comment.

The groupy then announced that, apart from aircrew, every man on the station had been allocated an invasion battle station and that immediately on hearing the signal - a sucession of short blasts on the air raid siren - all work would stop and men would take up those positions.

At this point all the Waafs were marched out. Whatever was to come was apparently not women's work. Then the names of the first party were read out: Sergeant X, Corporal Y and some twelve men. The lined up uncertainly in front of Groupy's table, and were harangued in a voice audible to all.

“When invasion comes." said Groupy, “you will go to the petrol dump. When German paratroopers drop, you will fire at them in the air (the party had some three or four rifles among them) and seize their weapons from them as they land. You will fight as long as you can fight and you will kill as many of the enemy as you can. I do not expect any of you to come back alive"...

...Gradually the hanger emptied until only aircrew were left. Groupy addressed us in much the same way. As soon as attack was known to be imminent, every possible aircraft would take to the air at once. We would attack enemy aircraft in the air, ramming them if necessary, and bombing and strafing enemy troop concentrations as they built up. None of us, either, would survive. When we had exhausted our supplies of bombs and ammo, we should fly to an RAF drome not under attack, refuel, rearm, and come back to the battle. Eventually we, too, should be killed.”

This strikes me as being insane given that (most likely unbeknownst to almost all armed forces personnel at the time) Hitler had offered Churchill peace talks for weeks before that point. The idea that these men would be expected to commit what amounts to kamikaze attacks when the war was ultimately unnecessary, is nothing short of remarkable.

His flying days came to an abrupt end when during a raid on airfields around Wilhelmshaven, both engines are shot out by flak and the crew are forced to ditch over occupied territory. What follows is a surreal experience where Passmore finds that he is the only remaining crew member on board, and jumps from the damaged aircraft below the parachute's minimum threshold altitude - saved only by the heat of the exploding aircraft beneath him which causes an updraft of air that fully opens his chute!

I have to say Passmore's Blenheim Boy has instantly become one of my favourite reads, and I will no doubt be reading again at some point in the future. Sadly the story ends abruptly when he is taken captive, but I will most certainly be buying the author's second book explaining his ordeals as a POW.