Booby Traps in Tobruk

Heroes Remember

Booby Traps in Tobruk

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Transcript

We landed in Tobruk. The Germans had been there about a month before. This was after Al' Alamayn and they were getting pushed back. And when we landed, there were six of us, aircraft. We just landed and we heard "ump" and we looked up and there was a cloud of stuff. Somebody had set off a land mine. I looked up and here's an Italian small fighter plane going around and around and I said, "This is a short career." There's a truck coming towards us with a black cross on the side and then a 6'2" Australian got out with his big sombrero and I said, we all said, "What's with the black cross?" He said, "We got tired paintin' it out." He said, "We were runnin' back and forth so often." We were goin' over lookin' at a cemetery and there was some British, there was some German, this little makeshift cemetery. But there were cases of ammunition, .5, 5 shell is about yea long and about that big around. Bob had picked one of them up out of the case. And this Australian said, "I wouldn't pick anymore up." He said, "A guy lost half of his face the other day doing that." He picked up one that was booby trapped. So we went looking for something to eat, it was early morning because you take off at night, this was early morning. So we go up to the mess tent and the only place with a roof on it at that time was the mess hall. Everything else had no roof on it or they were all beat up. And the cook says, "Blimey." He said, "We didn't know you were coming." You know, and here's thirty-six guys lookin for something to eat. So we had hardtack, a couple of slices of bacon and the mugs were soup tins for coffee. Bob Head, from Winnipeg, got killed, poor fella, on his last, last trip on operations. They had a Junkers, a Stuka dive bomber sitting on its nose just where we landed. The aircraft, it was all on the sand, there were no runways, it was just a long strip of desert. And I think he was due, he was climbing this barbwire fence to go have a look at this Stuka and it was a booby trap. It hadn't been touched for months. You had to be careful, any piece of wire layin' around you didn't pick it up, you don't know.

Description

Mr. Doiron's plane stopped in Tobruk. Though several months had passed since the end of the siege of Tobruk, the area was still booby trapped and this proved fatal to one of the crew.

Leonard Doiron

Mr. Doiron was born in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island on January 21st 1923. His father worked in wholesale and retail until he was injured and opened his own shoe repair shop. Mr. Doiron joined the Air Force on February 15th 1941 where he began his training in Chatham, New Brunswick. In June 1941 he was sent to Initial Training School in Victoriaville, Québec. Mr. Doiron was part of the top 10 aspiring pilots and was picked to become one. He was later sent back to Chatham where he was washed out for inconsistent flying. The RAFFC (Royal Air Force Ferry Command) noticed his Morse code abilities and had him transferred to Dorval, Québec. He was then stationed in Bournemouth, England. He did his Operational Training in Northern Ireland where he was assigned to a Wellington air plane crew. He flew many missions over the Gulf of Toranto (Italy) - about 300 hours of Operational Flying Time and was promoted to Warrant Officer Class 1. He then went to Cairo, Egypt and to Palestine for a short time before being sent back home on the Louis Pasteur. Mr. Doiron retired from the service in the 1970's.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 03:02
Person Interviewed:: Leonard Doiron
War, Conflict or Mission:: Second World War
Location/Theatre:: Europe
Branch:: Air Force
Units/Ship:: Royal Air Force Ferry Command (RAFFC)
Rank:: Sergeant
Occupation:: Radio Operator

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Booby Traps in Tobruk

Heroes Remember