Friendly Fire

Heroes Remember

Friendly Fire

Transcript

Probably the worse thing that we did get moved quite a few times on the march and there would be... on the one there was a thousand of us and the Germans were taking us to another camp and we got shot up by three Spitfires. They probably thought they were German troops, but I can remember the one time they came in and guys were waving their great coats, you know, the blue great coats. They came through anyway. They made... that one time, they made 2 passes at us. It was just three of them, but they made two passes and they killed over 100. Nothing ever happened to them. They’d only probably gone home and got a medal. Things like that were not too happy. Especially when it’s your own people... and Canadians at that. It... see the... you could take their numbers, they were so low. I don’t think anybody ever paid for it, but that was kind of demoralizing. And there was three captains, one of them was right here in Regina who... who took off. The German guards weren’t able to watch everybody. They weren’t watching anybody except for themselves it think, anyway three fellows took off and they got back to the British lines. Most of us felt that there was strength in numbers and that to get away on your own, you really could be in trouble, but they made it.

Description

Mr. Fawcett describes a forced march between two POW camps and being strafed by friendly aircraft.

Charlie Fawcett

Mr. Fawcett was born June 15, 1922 and grew up in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. He first became interested in planes when his father took him to Regina to go for a ride in one. It was this early interest in aviation that led him to sign up with the air force in 1942. He received gunnery training at Dafoe, SK and from there went overseas in the latter part of 1942. He chose to be a rear gunner as it was the fastest way to get overseas. Once in England he was assigned to an RAF squadron, stationed in Yorkshire, that consisted of an Australian pilot and an all English crew. In 1943, while on a trip to Czechoslovakia, they were shot down over Germany by a Messerschmitt. After bailing out of the aircraft Mr. Fawcett landed in a tree. The following day he was taken prisoner by the Germans. Over the next 2 ½ years he was interned in three different POW camps. Mr. Fawcett remained a POW until the end of the war.

Meta Data