Great Escapes (32 page)

At Le Mans he joined forces with an American Thunderbolt pilot desperate to get back to England and into the war. The whole town was crowded with refugees, soldiers moving forward and soldiers trying to get back to their units. In short it was chaotic. The American pilot had somehow got word that there was an airstrip close to the town of Mont St Michael, which was being used to ferry the wounded back to England. Acquiring some supplies, the two men walked and hitched rides until they reached the airfield. The Americans were running the airfield, and Eric Noakes’s companion managed to persuade the dispatcher that there might be room for two more aboard one of the Dakotas.

Back in England F/Sgt Eric Noakes reported for duty to find that he had been promoted to Warrant Officer during his absence. He was sent to London to be interrogated by Intelligence officers and then was allowed to go home on a well-earned leave.

Jack Gouinlock was an RCAF navigator when his aircraft was shot down. He evaded the Germans for some time before being captured. He then had the terrifying experience of digging his own grave before facing a firing squad. This is the story of how he survived.

Ten days before D-Day, the bomber offensive against Germany was increased dramatically. Bombers from RAF Bomber Command and the US Eighth Air Force pounded the gun emplacements, the railway yards, military camps and the roads in both France and Belgium, in an effort to prevent the German army rushing reinforcements to Normandy when the invasion took place.

On the night of 27 May 1944, Flg-Off Jack Gouinlock sat in the briefing room at RAF East Moor in Yorkshire listening to the information regarding their target that night. They were to bomb a large German military camp that was situated right in the middle of the Belgian town of Bourg Leopold. This was to call for very precise navigation and bomb aiming on the part of the crews of No.432 Squadron, RCAF. One hour later his B.III Halifax bomber, LK811 ‘N’ for Natch, lifted off the runway and headed for the Belgian coast.

The crew of ‘N’ for Natch was a mixed crew, inasmuch as three were RAF, four were RCAF and one was an American. The three RAF were: F/Sgt John Clark (flight engineer), Sgt Jack Rowan (wireless operator) and F/Sgt Tom McClay (tail-gunner). The four from Canada were: W/O Herb Rogers (mid-upper gunner), Flg-Off Jack Gouinlock (navigator), F/O Don Rutherford (bomb-aimer) and P/O Howard Menzies (pilot). The American was Sgt R.S. Hall the (co-pilot).

As they approached their target they could see where the Pathfinders had dropped their markers and so made their bombing run. In the nose of the Halifax, Don Rutherford hunched over his sights and when lined up, released the whole bomb load. The moment he heard the call ‘bombs gone’ Jack Gouinlock gave the pilot the course for home. With their target now in flames, the aircraft turned and headed for home. Then, just south of Eindhoven, they were ‘bounced’ by a Focke Wulf 190 which suddenly appeared as if from nowhere. The first anyone knew of it was when the tail-gunner shouted, ‘Fighter coming in!’ and opened up with his browning machine-guns. Seconds later the mid-upper gunner opened up followed by a roar of the Halifax’s engines as the pilot poured on the power in an effort to take evasive action. The next second there was a violent explosion and both port engines burst into flames.

The next second Howard Menzie’s voice came over the intercom: ‘She’s going down – bale out’. Jack Gouinlock needed no second warning and swiftly clipping on his parachute, he opened the forward escape hatch that was directly in front of his position and dived through it. He was met by a violent wind that tore the breath from his lungs and his boots from his feet. Fumbling for the D-ring that would open his parachute as he plummeted towards the ground, he gave it an almighty tug which was followed by a jolt that jarred every bone in his body and then he was floating gently towards the ground. Twisting round, he watched as his aircraft smashed into the ground and exploded in an almighty fireball. As he floated down to earth he wondered how many other members of the crew managed to get out.

He landed in the middle of a ploughed field and for a moment just lay there recovering. Scrambling to his feet he unclipped his parachute and bundled it up. Then, whilst moving over to the edge of the field towards a clump of trees, he realised that his feet were only protected by thin socks. On reaching the edge, he buried the parachute beneath a pile of wood and covered it with leaves. He then took off his battledress top and removed all of the insignia, and at the same time recovered the tiny compass that he had sewn beneath his navigator’s wings. Checking the contents of his escape kit, Jack Gouinlock headed off in a south-westerly direction.

The thin socks on his feet were soon shredded as he stumbled across the fields. He walked through the night and as dawn was breaking he came across a number of people going to work in the fields. They stared at him suspiciously and gave him a wide berth when they saw the Air Force blue battledress jacket. Jack realised that he was going to have to try and make contact with the Resistance before one of the local people turned him over to the Germans out of fear.

He continued to walk through the morning seeing no one else until he came across a small farmhouse and a man working in a field close by. With his feet badly bruised and cut, Jack knew that he could continue no longer and approached the man. Taking a phrase card from his escape kit, Jack managed to explain to the man that he had been shot down and wanted help. At first the man was suspicious but then invited Jack to follow him into his house. There the farmer’s wife made him a meal out of bread and meat, and then she dressed a cut on his forehead and the numerous cuts on his feet. Jack asked where he was and found out that he was right on the Dutch-Belgian border. The farmer then produced an old pair of overalls and a pair of strong shoes, which were slightly too big but fitted because of his swollen feet.

As darkness fell the farmer shrugged his shoulders and indicated that he would like to have helped more, but he had a wife and children and the penalty for helping an allied airman was death. However, he led him to the canal which marked the border between the two countries before saying goodbye. Jack thanked him for his help and started walking along the canal path looking for a place to cross. He came across a bridge but then spotted a sentry box with a German guard. Realising that it was too risky to cross at that moment, he found a small clump of trees away from the canal that still enabled him to see the bridge.

Tiredness was now overcoming over him; it had been more than twenty-four hours since he had parachuted out of his burning aircraft and he needed to sleep. After crawling into a clump of bushes just inside the wood, he fell sound asleep. He awoke suddenly and for the moment was confused as to where he was, but quickly it all came back to him. He glanced at his watch, which showed 2 a.m., and then walked silently towards the bridge. As he crept closer he could hear a snoring sound and realised that the German guard too was catching up on his sleep. Taking off his shoes and hanging them around his neck, Jack crawled on all fours silently across the bridge and into Belgium.

Determined to put as much distance as he could between himself and the border, Jack Gouinlock strode briskly southwards. Around midday he stopped to eat some of his escape rations and take stock of his situation. His feet were still painful, but nowhere near as bad as they had been. Walking on a bit further, he came across a farmhouse and decided to take a chance on getting some help.

When he knocked on the door, it was opened by a middle-aged woman who, after he had explained who he was, welcomed him in with great enthusiasm. He was taken into the kitchen where a large plate of bread and cheese was placed in front of him. He devoured it with great relish and then noticed the woman whispering something to two of her children, who then slipped out of the door.

The woman could not help but notice his uneasiness at this stage and quickly assured him that he was amongst friends. Thirty minutes later the door opened and the children returned accompanied by two young women who introduced themselves in excellent English as Mary and Golly Smets. Jack Gouinlock soon realised during the time he was being questioned by the two women that they were no amateurs at interrogating people. Satisfied that he was who he said he was, they relaxed and told him that they would have to move him, as the farmhouse was a regular place for Germans to visit when looking for food. Jack Gouinlock also felt a sense of relief because now he knew he was in the hands of a section of the Resistance.

At sunset, the farmer took Jack to a secluded wood where he was to wait until the two young women came to fetch him. Just as it was getting dark the two girls arrived and led him through the wood and into a small village called Exel. They took him to a small house where Mme Smets, the girl’s mother, was waiting. She welcomed her visitor in, sat him down and interrogated him once more. Jack thought the girls were thorough, but their mother was an expert. She explained, after she was satisfied, that they could not afford to be careless because the Gestapo were infiltrating the Resistance using English-speaking agents posing as downed airmen, and a large number of arrests had been made because of this.

Once he had settled in, Jack Gouinlock discovered that he was their seventh guest in as many months and arrangements were being made to take him to another safe house the following night. Their home appeared to be the ‘clearing house’ for escaped airmen, but because of its close proximity to the local Gestapo headquarters it was not the safest of places in which to hide evading airmen.

The next evening a man arrived to take him to a safe house some 2 miles outside of the village. The family, the Vanderhoedoncks, consisted of three sisters and a brother who ran a small farm producing a variety of vegetables that they supplied to a nearby German hospital. In return the Germans allowed them an additional ration of foodstuffs. This also gave them special status as far as the Germans were concerned, which meant that they were left alone except for those who came to barter with them.

When Jack Gouinlock arrived, he was made aware of another visitor living at the farm, an orphaned German schoolboy whose family had been killed in an allied air raid. No one except the immediate members of the family was to know of Gouinlock’s presence and so a system of schedules and signals were created so that he was never seen, even by the local labourers who worked for the family. There was one other guest at the farm and that was Freddie Ceyssens, a nephew of the family who regarded Jack Gouinlock’s presence there as a great honour, but one that was to be kept secret.

Jack did not realise at the time but this was to be his home for the next two months. Two nights after arriving word came through that the Germans were looking for an allied airman, and so Jack was hustled out into a nearby wood together with some blankets just in case the
Feldpolizei
paid a surprise visit. This was to be part and parcel of Jack’s stay at the farmhouse and one way he found to relieve the boredom was to tutor young Freddie in English, whilst learning Dutch himself.

As well as regular visits by the Germans to buy or requisition food there were regular visits by the Resistance, and on one of these occasions they brought a new identity for Jack Gouinlock. He was given a forged identity and work permit in the name of Jean Victor Joseph Boland, using the photograph he had had taken before he left England that was put inside his escape kit.

As the days passed into weeks, news came through that the Germans were retreating, but not as fast as had initially been anticipated. The roads were crammed with German troops being rushed to the Front, and refugees fleeing away from the fighting. Then suddenly the situation changed when on 24 July an American B-17 bomber returning from a raid was shot down. The entire crew managed to bale out and, of the ten, nine managed to evade capture and were picked up by the Resistance. The tenth member of the crew, the pilot, had broken his ankle on landing and was captured.

The nine men put a great deal of strain on the Resistance’s resources and caused immense problems in finding enough safe houses for them. It was decided to move them all, including Jack Gouinlock, much to the dismay of the Vanderhoedoncks because he was now regarded as almost a member of the family. It was an emotional day for the family when he left and the two Smets girls arrived on bicycles to take him to Bourg Leopold where he was to be placed in another safe house. Leading the way to the town was young Freddie, cycling ahead and acting as a scout. Jack had certain reservations about his welcome in Bourg Leopold, as it was this town that his squadron had bombed when he was shot down. He knew the bombing had been quite accurate, but he surmised that there were bound to be some bombs that would have gone astray.

He was boarded with a middle-aged couple whose house was directly opposite the German base. They were a fearless pair and insisted on taking Jack with them when they went for their evening walk past the camp, and introduced him to their many friends in the café where they would stop and have a drink. Jack realised that this was probably the safest move, because by acting naturally it would not draw any suspicion on them and it was much easier than having the problem of concealing him.

Two days later he and the American crew, who were staying in another part of town, were moved again, this time to Liége. They were given instructions on where they were to board the tram and how to recognise their guide. Boarding the trolley alongside German soldiers was very unnerving for Jack and sitting amongst them he prayed that no one would ask him a question or try to engage him in conversation.

He had spotted his guide at the tram stop and upon reaching the town of Hasselt his guide got off, indicating that he should too. The others also got off at this stop where there were members of the Resistance waiting to meet them and take them on to Liége. Jack’s guide, Arthur, who was the leader of the Resistance in the area, indicated to him to follow him and turning a corner Jack saw his guide get onto a motorcycle. Climbing onto the pillion, Jack clung on as the bike roared off. The fact that petrol was in short supply was an indicator to Jack that Arthur had some very good contacts. Speeding through the lanes and passing nothing but German army lorries heading towards the Front was quite worrying for Jack Gouinlock but it did not seem to faze his guide one bit.