{"id":2309,"date":"2010-02-21T10:24:59","date_gmt":"2010-02-21T14:24:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/?p=2309"},"modified":"2010-02-21T10:24:59","modified_gmt":"2010-02-21T14:24:59","slug":"a-reluctant-co-pilot-british-humour-and-an-unassuming-fellow-volunteering-at-the-norwich-archive-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/2010\/02\/a-reluctant-co-pilot-british-humour-and-an-unassuming-fellow-volunteering-at-the-norwich-archive-centre\/","title":{"rendered":"A “Reluctant Co-Pilot,” British Humour and an “Unassuming Fellow”: Volunteering at the Norwich Archive Centre"},"content":{"rendered":"

On February 11th<\/sup> and February 18th<\/sup> I was able to make my fourth and fifth visits to the Norwich Archive Centre.\u00a0 I was able to listen to around six audio recordings from US WWII veterans.\u00a0 I won\u2019t mention all of them but I will try to touch on a few.\u00a0 The first audio recording was of a veteran who served primarily as a co-pilot throughout the Second World War.\u00a0 He mentions basic training and gives a brief overview of some bombing missions he took part in.\u00a0 For the most part this audio recording was fairly straight forward with few anecdotes.\u00a0 However, one interesting thing to note is that this veteran published a book about his experience during the War \u2013 \u201cThe Saga of a Reluctant Co-Pilot\u201d (available at the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library). In the audio recording, he expands on his reluctance.\u00a0 He notes that he was unhappy most of the time with military life.\u00a0 The training was too regimented in his opinion and as a result he never got to make close friendships; this was only compounded by the fact that groups changed frequently.<\/p>\n

The next audio recording was also of a co-pilot of a B-24.\u00a0 After briefly going over his training he was keen to mention his plane, \u201cGerocko.\u201d\u00a0 He noted how its unique nose art made it stand out from all the other aircraft.\u00a0 Being stationed in Britain, he watched cricket for the first time with a certain fascination.\u00a0 He then notes all the types of missions he fly while in Britain.\u00a0 These range from bombing aircraft plants to railroad yards to airfields to V1 rocket sites to oil refineries.\u00a0 In total he flew 24 missions but he did have a few notable missions.\u00a0 The one that really stood out was a bombing mission to Evereux, France<\/a>.\u00a0 During the course of the mission, his plane took damage to the engines and they were forced to land on French soil.\u00a0 Interestingly, because of the forced landing his plane was the first four-engine bomber to land on free French soil.<\/p>\n

The next veteran was a ball turret gunner for a B-24.\u00a0 He mentions enlisting at 18, being inducted in 1942 and describes his training.\u00a0 He has numerous anecdotes including one about the English sense of humor.\u00a0 Noting the poor weather one day to an Englishman, the veteran asked, \u201cDo you ever have summer?\u201d\u00a0 The Englishman replied, \u201cYes, I believe we do and it came on a Saturday last year.\u201d\u00a0 The next anecdote he mentions is about a train ride back from London.\u00a0 On the train he noticed a particularly attractive young Englishwoman.\u00a0 Mustering up courage, he was able to start a conversation with her.\u00a0 Eventually he managed to ask her if could have her address so they could go on a date.\u00a0 She agreed and he took out a slip of paper to write on but unfortunately could not find a pen or pencil on him.\u00a0 However, when he looked up he noticed two Englishmen and two Englishwomen offering pens.\u00a0 So he got the address after all.<\/p>\n

Before I end I have to mention an interesting development at the Norwich Archive Centre.\u00a0 In my last blog post I ended with a story of WWII veteran who was interned in Turkey.\u00a0 From his audio recording I had the suspicion that he was involved with some type of covert operation or involved with the OSS (Office of Strategic Services).\u00a0 One of the archivists mentioned that this veteran actually came to the Norwich Archive Centre about a week ago.\u00a0 The archivist was able to speak with him for a bit and it was revealed that this “unassuming fellow” was actually ex-CIA.<\/p>\n

Volunteer Time: 4 hrs. 30 mins.<\/p>\n

Total Time: 10 hrs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On February 11th and February 18th I was able to make my fourth and fifth visits to the Norwich Archive Centre.\u00a0 I was able to listen to around six audio recordings from US WWII veterans.\u00a0 I won\u2019t mention all of them but I will try to touch on a few.\u00a0 The first audio recording was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[733],"tags":[2033,2032,1539,2031,1982,2021],"class_list":["post-2309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-andrew-f","tag-2nd-air-division","tag-american-veterans","tag-british-humour","tag-norwich-archieve-centre","tag-oral-history","tag-volunteering"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2309"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2309\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}