An interlude during WW2. By Doug Reich

Doug flew Mustang 1's from Sawbridgeworth airfield in Hertfordshire. He often sends me small snippets from his diary. As I get them I shall post them here.

“An interlude during World War II”

In September 1943, II Sqn was based at Odiham. The Sqn was due to leave for Hutton Cranswick, to support the Guards Armoured division in a large exercise. We were to leave on Sunday 22nd September, so a party was organised for Saturday 21st, and I went into Alton, and had dinner and a few beers before returning to the mess at about 10 pm.

Two coloured Americans from a nearby base had set up a cocktail bar and were singing and jiving, whilst mixing the most formidable cocktails. I was absolutely fascinated with them and watched them for a long time. About midnight I decided to try a cocktail and ordered a “Blonde Bombshell”. As soon as I drank it I knew I had made a mistake. The blood seemed to drain from my head to my feet and a red hot flush shot through my body. Feeling very peculiar I staggered off to bed.

On waking up, feeling shattered, I went down for breakfast and noticing how quiet it was, asked the waiter where everyone was. He gave me a queer look and said “2 Sqn left yesterday.” I thought something was wrong when I looked at the paper and it was dated Monday… the Yanks had slipped me a Mickey Finn and I had slept through Sunday!

When I looked at the airfield there was just my lone Mustang sitting there. As I was still feeling groggy I stayed for lunch at Odiham and later in the afternoon flew to Hutton Cranswick where I explained to the CO, Sqn Ldr Mike Grey, what had happened. He was quite amused and thought it was a good joke on me. We were under canvas and it was bitterly cold and damp, so I applied for 14 days’ leave, and left them to it. On my return the exercise was over and we returned to Odiham – I being the only fit pilot! All the others had colds and coughs, so in the end, I came out best!.

© Doug Reich, from a letter to Denis