The Battle of the Ruhr was a heavily concentrated attack on Germany’s war machine. It started on the 5th March 1943 with a 442 aircraft raid on Essen in the heavily industrialised Ruhr Valley. It ended on the 30th July 1943 and the last raid on Essen, a couple of days before, utilised 600 aircraft dropping their bombs on the city in the space of one hour and finally stopping production of steel at the Krupp armament factories. The battle was successful in that the production of sub-components, aircraft and locomotives was seriously curtailed and Germany struggled to manufacture the arms and equipment it needed to wage total war. The cost to the Allies of the Battle of the Ruhr was the loss of 138 bombers and more than 5,000 young airmen.
This is Teddy’s log book page of operational sorties. He was grounded for a couple of weeks in March with an ear infection. It clearly shows the concentration of attacks by Bomber Command during the battle of the Ruhr. It shows that Teddy and the crew took part in the 442 aircraft opening raid to Essen on 5th March with Krupps being the primary target.
Raids on targets outside the Ruhr were still continuing as the record shows. The Skoda armaments factory in Pilzen, the Italian port of La Spezia and Stettin in Poland were other targets on sorties flown by the crew of K-Kitty.
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For a more informed look at the Battle of the Ruhr click to visit the Wikipedia page.
The photo, from Vince Holyoak’s collection, may be the one referred to in the squadron ORB for 3rd March 1943 (see right), when Gomm was met by a YMCA van on return from Berlin in PO-V. V for Victory.
This photo is of the Commander of RAF Bottesford, Wing Commander Cosme Gomm DSO, DFC (left) and his crew. He piloted Lancasters on many sorties and was shot down and killed near Chartres en route to Milan on 15th August 1943.
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This 20 minute recording is of a famous broadcast by Ed Murrow of CBS who accompanied a Lancaster crew on a night raid to Berlin and made the broadcast the following day. It is entitled ‘Orchestrated Hell’ and is very moving.
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This photograph, taken during a raid on a German city, shows the amount of flak in the air.
Orchestrated Hell
BBC reporters flew on several sorties over Germany during the campaign. Below are Wynford Vaughan-Thomas and Reg Pidsley who made these recordings of crew talking over the intercom whilst on bombing runs and under enemy attack. They used a recording device called a Riverside Portable Midget Disc Recorder that looked like a gramophone
Being on the receiving end of a bombing raid, in either Country, was just as terrifying and somebody has even recorded how that sounded.
Sound Recordings
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There were lighter moments during some flights, as this letter shows
The biggest raid in the Battle of the Ruhr was the raid on Dortmund of 23rd May 1943 and PO-K was one of 343 Lancasters involved from a total of 826 aircraft. 38 aircraft were lost on the raid but it successfully caused the destruction of the Hoesch steelworks. Teddy and the crew were again the focus of journalists on their return and this picture of six of them was published in The Daily Sketch. It was probably the last picture taken of Teddy (second from right).
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John Lockwood
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John Ryalls
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Keith Cazaly
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George Cribbin
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Teddy Davis
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George Paddon
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The Battle of the Ruhr encompassed the famous ’Operation Chastise’, commonly called The Dam Busters Raid, on the Mohne, Eder and Sorpe dams. Bouncing bombs designed by Barnes Wallis were succesfully delivered by Lancasters of 617 squadron.
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Journalists often visited military bases and sometimes even flew on bombing raids and made sound recordings
These recordings by Vaughan-Thomas and Pidsley were made on flights to Berlin, Essen and Stettin. Press the buttons to play the audio files.
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Playing the audio files: Firefox users please wait for the audio file to download to a temp folder before it plays. Internet Explorer and Chrome will stream the media and start playing almost immediately.