MN145

MN379

PD492

MN869

MN691

F/O Johns R.A.

F/O MacDonald R.N.

F/O Swingler B.P.

F/O Laurence R.H.

F/O Stelter J.

F/O McBride A.C.

The railway line southeast of Venlo (map ref E.9603) was the target for the Ramrod early this morning. F/O Johns led our six aircraft into the air at 07:30 hours and despite poor visibility and 10/10 cloud at 4,000 feet, the railway was attacked in a shallow dive from the east. The dive was carried down to 1,000 feet and six 500 lb bombs cut the line. The remaining six scored very near misses. A goodly amount of both light and heavy flak was fired at us from the target area but no damage was done to our aircraft.

Following this attack a rather successful armed recce was carried out. A train of 25 goods trucks moving north towards Geldern (E.9919) was attacked and the locomotive damaged. F/O Johns also straffed the goods trucks, no results observed.

A second train was seen slowly puffing its way westwards towards Geldern (A.0425) and the locomotive was smitten by the gentle pats of six quartets of 20mm cannon. A third engineer had the misfortune to fall into our view and his train of 20 goods trucks moving northwards towards Kempen was left in a state of serious disrepair at map ref. A.1206. One Met was also set on fire in the first attacks against the train near Geldern. The highway was quite close to the railway at this point. All aircraft returned to base

All aircraft returned to base and pancaked at 08:30 hours.

MP151

MN379

PD492

MN869

MN989

MN691

MP145

F/L Monson A.E.

F/O Burgess C.L.

F/O Stitt J.H.

F/O Cote J.A.

F/O Hogg J.E.

F/O Smith R.V.

F/O Rassenti N.H.

F/O Fraser J.G.

Details of Sortie or Flight

This Ramrod against the railway line at Geldern, was carried out by eight aircraft of our Squadron who released two 500 lb. bombs (11 sec. delay) each. The attack was made from the south in a 40 degree dive which carried the aircraft from 4,000 feet down to 500 feet. The bombing was closely concentrated and all scored near misses but the line was not cut. Some intense light accurate was fired from the target area but none of our aircraft were damaged.

Subsequent to the unsuccessful railway attacks, the Squadron carried out attacks against scattered MET in the area and the two Sections under F/L Monson and F/O Hogg, scored 2 flamers and 2 damaged MET. A small river boat was attacked by all eight aircraft and was left smoking at Grieth (Map Ref. A.0353). The aircraft pancaked at base at 1210 hours.

MN969

MN870

MN665

F/O Rassenti N.H.

P/O McBride A.C.

F/O Bernhart P.N.

F/O Laurence R.H.

At the end of the runway, the Wing has been placing 8 aircraft on readiness. These 8 aircraft were scrambled by Control at 12:50 hours today and 4 of them were ours, while the other 4 were 440 Squadron. The weather was bad with rain in some places and 10/10ths cloud at 3,000 feet. The show was carried out as a patrol near Nijmegen but proved uneventful. All aircraft landed safely at 13:20 hours.

MN869

MN345

MP145

JR500

MN379

MN574

PD492

F/L Burton W.D.

F/O Carr J.

F/O Laycock M.P.

F/O Fraser J.G.

F/O Swingler B.P.

F/O MacDonald

W/O Gray W.A.

F/O Laurence R.H.

'

'

'

'

'

15:40

15:50

Details of Sortie or Flight

The weather began to clear somewhat and the campaign against railroad lines was re-opened as eight of our Bomphoons took to the air at 14:40 hours under command of F/L Burton. The targets, railway lines in the vicinity of Geldern were attacked in two places by Red and Blue Section. Red Section attacked the line at A.013257 and released 8 bombs of which two scored direct hits and cut the line. F/L Burton then led his section mates in an attack on a train at A.0125 just north of Geldern, and inflicted heavy damage on the engine.

Blue Section, led by F/O Swingler, attacked the rail line at A.0644 just northeast of Xanten, and although all bombs were closely grouped in the target area, no one was able to state that the railway had been definitely cut. Following the bombing, Blue Section attacked a large passenger bus at Vymen (A.0844) and damaged it.

A train with six goods trucks was then attacked and damaged at map reference A.0323 south of Geldern. In the first attack, W/O Nick Gray pulled his aircraft away streaming glycol from the radiator. F/O Lawrence informed W/O Gray of that, but Nick carried out a second attack on the train. The section set course for home almost at once and Nick kept losing height as he came. The white glycol trail turned to black as the aircraft caught fire and spun into the ground from about 1,000 feet. W/O Gray did not bale out despite repeated instruction to do so. He is believed killed.

MN581

PD492

MP136

F/O Hogg J.E.

P/O McBride A.C.

F/O Bernhart P.N.

F/O Cote J.A.

Details of Sortie or Flight

These four aircraft were sent into the air with 500 lb. bombs (23 sec delay) to attack the railway line  that had not been cut on the previous show at Xanten. Visibility was extremely poor and a 10/10ths cloud layer was at 3,500 feet. En route to the target, the formation became split up in cloud and P/O McBride returned to base alone with his bombs. F/O Hogg, in charge of the flight reached the target and bombed it alone. He did not observe the results of the attack.

Meanwhile, F/OP Bernhart was flying through the cloud fringe searching for landmarks with F/O Cote some distance behind. F/O Cote looked back over his tail and was just a little surprised to see two FW-190's sitting there. F/O Cote jettisoned his bombs immediately and broke to starboard. The 109's fired one short ineffective burst and pulled away into cloud. F/O Cote wasted no time in rejoining F/O Bernhart and both aircraft returned to base. All four aircraft landed at base safely shortly afterwards.