Day: 5 July 2018

An early start today: a 4:00am take off for a dawn reconnaissance/counter battery patrol, which saw some action.  Greg obviously enjoyed himself.

Log Book

Date: 5.7.18 
Hour: 4. am 
Machine type: RE8 
No.: E27 
Passenger: Lt Pring 
Time: 2 hrs 15 
Height: 5000 
Course/Remarks: Dawn CBP.  Good time.

Diary

Friday July 5th 1918  Dawn Counter Battery Patrol.  Took off at 4 am just before daylight.

Went over to Estaires, saw a train standing by Estaires – pulled off the bombs & missed it by about 100 yards so turned to let observer fire 100 rounds into it.  Train moved off Eastwards.

Half an hour later saw a lorry moving up to Merville.  Dived on him & let him have 50 rounds from the front gun, then turned and observer gave him 100 rounds, after which the lorry ran off the road into the hedge.  Fired off the rest of the rounds into Fritz’s huts around Merville.

Got seven Archie holes through plane.

Archie

With seven holes through the plane, Archie (anti-aircraft fire) was definitely pretty hot.  Archie explained here:

Thursday 13 June 1918 – CBP and ‘Archie’

Squadron Record Book

Duty: Dawn Reconn:

Hour of Start: 4.0am

Hour of Return: 6.25am

Remarks: 4.20am cloud, suspected gas, drifting Eastwards over L.9 & 15. 4.20am fire L.5.a.4.3. 4.25am train in L36a. 4-25lb bombs and 100 rounds Lewis fired at it.  Bursts seen 100 yards S. of train which proceeded East. 4.30am sent N.D. 4.35am C.W.S. sent X. 4.40am sent K.K. 4.45am train proceeding East from ESTAIRES. 4.48am lorry at K.24.d.5.7 proceedings towards MERVILLE. 150 rounds fired at it from both guns.  Turned off the road into the hedge.  4.50am K.K. flash in M.2. 4.55am trains at LAVANTIE and BAC ST MAUR.  4.55am A.A. firing from K.22.c.8.4. 5.0am C.W.S. sent X. 5.10am train in A.13 proceeding East.  5.15am 1 E.K.B. N. and behind ESTAIRES.  5.20am and 5.45am explosions at L.5.c.7.7.  5.25am explosion at Q.30.a.5.2. 5.40am C.W.S. sent L.C. No flashes seen in that zone.  5.45am train at BAC ST MAUR. 5.50am train at G.32.c proceeding towards ESTAIRES. 6.5am 1. E.K.B. S. of ESTAIRES.  250 rounds Vickers fired into various targets including houses behind MERVILLE. 400 round Lewis at various targets.  A.A. normal. E.A. nil. Vis. fair, ground mist. Obs. By P. & O.

So it was a busy patrol, but also evidently an exhilarating one – “good time” was the verdict.