Free Diary And Letters Of A World War I Fighter Pilot, The by Christopher Burgess Page A

gone & so I am living in what I have got on! I bought a very nice Haversack. I was down in Dover yesterday morning but couldn’t get off. Two other officers & a lot of men & myself were doing an anti-gas course. I put on a filthy gas box respirator, you can only breathe through your mouth through a rubber tube & you breathe in air through a box containing potash permanganate, hypo and other diabolic compounds; your nose meanwhile being firmly held by a kind of clothes peg! Having put on this mask I had to go into a hut & shut the door & a man proceeded to turn on chlorine gas from a cylinder on the floor, we stayed in about 10 minutes & then went out. As a matter of fact you can’t tell you are in gas & might be breathing ordinary air.
    We are sleeping in billets at Wye now as all our kit has gone. I will try to get over again before I go. We have got that new windscreen on our buses & the cowling cut away which is a great improvement; there is less draught & much more room.
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    Bunsoy
    65. Wye, Kent.
    26th October 1917
    We couldn’t go over today as it has been raining all day at St Omer – very rotten! I can’t get down to Dover as we have to be up at 7 am tomorrow & it wouldn’t be worth it.
    Enclosed is a Squadron photo, I am there. Also a picture of all 18 buses ready to start, mine is 5th from the end.
    No more news – bestest love & Cheerie Ho!
    From The Bunsoy
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    DIARY Friday 26th October 1917
    Got up at 6.45 – at aerodrome at 7 am – Good weather. Weather raining at Saint-Omer. Hung about aerodrome all day – no flying as dud at Omer all day.
    Went to say goodbye to London & Miss Pates with Pitt [Lieutenant G.H. Pitt] in evening after tea. Got a lift back in van. Dinner at Kings Head.
    Bed early – v tired and bored. Phoned up Dad.
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    Letter from Colonel Cuthbert G. Knocker to his son 2nd Lieutenant Guy M. Knocker RA / RFC (born 1899 – aged 18) on the latter’s departure to France from Wye Aerodrome, Kent, with 65 Squadron (Camels).
    At the time, Colonel Knocker, aged 60 – late 21st Royal Scots Fusiliers, was OC Dover District as a retired officer – from May 1916 to the end of WW I. He was decommissioned sub lieutenant in the RSF in 1875; born in Madras in the year of the Indian Mutiny 1857.
    [Supplementary information from Lieutenant Colonel Robert King-Clark, Cuthbert Knocker’s grandson and GMK’s nephew.]
    8 Marine Parade
Dover
    27 October ‘ 17
    My very dear Bunsoy,
    So you are across the water at last. We have all been on the qui viri since yesterday morning and have done lots of sky-gazing in that time. As you know we were up at Archcliffe at 7:30 am yesterday, and at 8:30 we went down to the beach near the Lord Warden Hotel. This morning Mother and I saw Eily [Daughter Eileen, a VAD nurse in France with the BEF.] off and then went on to the beach again and waited ‘till 10 am thinking perhaps that you would be some little time getting away and that we might see something of your squadron, but were disappointed. When I got to the office I phoned to Wye to find out when the squadron left and the answer came back 9:10 so we were probably at the station when you crossed the coast or you were too far to the West for us to see you. I am sorry we missed you but it could not be helped. If you dropped a note I wonder if I shall ever get it!
    Well dear son your active service has now begun and there is lots of hard fighting yet in front of our Troops, in which you will take your share. May God in His mercy keep you in safety at all times, and may the Everlasting Arms be underneath and around you is my earnest prayer. You have been a dear good son and never occasioned your mother or father a moment’s anxiety as to your conduct. I have not the slightest fear that you will always do your duty nobly and fearlessly. Whether you get rewards or not I feel that there is no flying officer in your Corps who will have a record for duty