The men on board the Lancaster bomber knew they were in trouble.
They were returning to base after a bombing raid in Germany when there was a loud bang from under the plane.
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| The plane's ill-fated crew |
‘Suddenly a shell hit the port landing wheel, ricocheted and exploded,’ recalled pilot John Wynne. ‘There was a bang and then a flash and some of the hot fragments hit the inner port engine.’
The oil pressure plummeted and then fire broke out in the stricken engine. Wireless operator Tom Tate remembers the order to bale out. He obeyed, hurling himself into the rushing darkness. So did his fellow crew.
It was March, 1945, and the crew hoped to land in Allied-held territory west of the Rhine.
Instead, they landed in Nazi Germany, close to the town of Pforzheim. It had been destroyed in an RAF firestorm just a few weeks previously.
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| The doomed plane |
Tom and the six other crew landed safely. But they were swiftly arrested and taken to the village of Huchenfeld where they were held prisoner in the boiler room of the local school.
News of their capture soon reached Hans Knab, the thuggish Nazi leader of Pforzheim. He summoned the local Hitler Youth commander, Max Kochlin, and told him: ‘Now you must get hold of your Hitler Youth people. Tonight we shall stage a demonstration.’
Kochlin gathered a group of Hitler Youth lads, gave them guns and delivered a fiery, anti-British speech. When they arrived at Huchenfeld, they demanded access to the English crew.
‘I remember being hauled up the iron staircase,’ says Tom Tate. ‘I was thinking to myself: what on earth is this all about?’ He soon realised something was seriously wrong. ‘Someone hit me on the head. Blood flowed. God, I thought, this is lynching.’
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| How the Mail reported the story |
The mob jostled their captives towards a barn. The door was ajar and Tate noticed ropes handing from the beams. Convinced that they were going to be hanged, the survival instinct kicked in.
‘I burst away from the people around me and I ran,’ recalls Tate. ‘I was in bare feet. I was dodging people … running up the road.’
Shots rang out, putting an even greater spring in his step. Certain to be killed if captured, he leaped over fences and then plunged into a thicket.
He continued into the darkness until he found himself in a little plantation of oaks, where he decided to hide.
Tate was not alone in getting away. Flight sergeant Norman Bradley had also made his escape.
‘I heard shots from automatic weapons,’ he recalls. ‘Several bursts.’
By the time he was recaptured, he was more than 20 miles from Pforzheim. Tom Tate had also been recaptured. The two men would spend the remainder of the war as prisoners.
A third airman, James Vinall, had also attempted to escape but he was recaptured almost immediately. He was then released into the custody of a local Nazi leader who beat him around the head before shooting him in the back of the head.
The remaining airmen also met with violent ends: Sidney Matthews, Harold Frost, Edward Percival and Gordon Hall were all shot by adolescents from the Hitler Youth.
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| The graves at Huchenfeld |
It would be another year before the details came to light. At the War Crimes Proceedings - at which Tom Tate and Norman Bradley gave evidence - Pforzheim’s Nazi leader, Hans Knab, was found guilty. He was hanged, along with two other Nazi officials.
Two of the members of the Hitler Youth were sentenced to 15 years, as did the killer of James Vinall. Eleven others were imprisoned.
That seemed to be the end of the story, but there was to be a remarkable post-script that would bring victims and perpetrators together almost half a century later.
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| Tom Tate today |
In 1992, a memorial was erected at the scene of the execution. At the dedication service, attended by the widow of one of the murdered men, an elderly man in the congregation suddenly broke down in tears. In whispered tones, he told one of the clergy: ‘I was one of the Hitler Youth who shot that night. I killed them. Forgive me but I don’t have the strength to meet her.’
His act of expiation touched the dead airman’s widow to the core. ‘I want to give my hand and say I have no bitterness any more,’ she said.
Since that memorial service, Tom Tate has also visited Huchenfeld. After years of bitterness, he was finally able to forgive. ‘When someone comes with arms open to embrace you,’ he says, ‘you can’t feel enmity any more. The act of friendship invites forgiveness.’
Do visit my website: www.gilesmilton.com
My new book is Wolfram: The Boy Who Went to War
