Fair Game

We did a lot of dive bombing too! The Spitfire could carry a thousand pounds of bombs; 500 between the oleo legs and 250 under each wing. We dive bombed marshalling yards and bridges and so on and we would be loaded with that and take off for targets of opportunity. If we saw that ... this is what we would do. Anything that moved was fair game and pickings would be fairly slim at one time. Here again, I don’t want to sound crass or whatever but this is ... this was the wartime so whatever you could do to impede the movement of troops or supplies and so on was gonna help our effort. And we were shooting and doing so much that they questioned the numbers we were turning in. Because on one sortie alone I think I got eighteen – or something – mechanical transports with Ed Price along with me. We didn’t use a lot of ammunition. I used just my cannon and all you needed was three or four cannon if you hit it properly and the same with the train. If I got it properly in the boiler... because they had this cut off at the smoke stack to stop the steam coming out ... they closed that off. Well the pressure’s there and all ya had to do was put three or four shells in there and it would explode and you could strafe the train. Even dispatch riders. This time ... Rodd Smith was flying with me – just the two of us – and I spotted this dispatch rider and so I went down and he saw me and I missed him. He dodged behind some trees and so I pull up and I keep my eye on him. I’m up over the top – right off the deck – I’m over the top actually sort of doing a loop when Rodd said, “What the heck are you doing?” I said, “I got my eye on him!” And so I pulled around and came down and this is where the dispatch rider bailed off and into the ditch so I came back. He had to walk from there ... I got his ... I got his motorcycle. So he had a fair distance to walk ... but that was one of the things that ... fair game I guess. But in that particular case he ended up walking.

Mr. Fox describes attacking targets of opportunity and explains that anything that moved was fair game.

Charley Fox

Mr. Fox was born in Guelph, Ontario in 1920. He signed up in March, 1940, and was called up the following October. Mr. Fox excelled during pilot training, but a bout of scarlet fever prevented him from accompanying his squadron overseas. Once returned to health, he became a flight instructor, during which time he married. A short time later, he was sent overseas and joined the 412 Spitfire Squadron. He was involved in air support for D-Day and flew many follow-up missions destroying “targets of opportunity” in France and Holland. After the war, Mr. Fox returned home and became a retailer. He now resides in London, Ontario.