Rhubarb Missions

Heroes Remember

Rhubarb Missions

Transcript

During this period of 1943 when your squadron was involved in sweeps over enemy occupied France and low countries, tell me, Mr. Sager, what does the expression "Rhubarb" mean to you? Oh, where did you hear that, Rhubarb? There were several types of them. There were Roadstead, there's a, a, a Sweep, there's a Circus. A Rhubarb was a low, a low flying one or two man entry intervention over enemy territory. A Rhubarb was normally carried out in bad weather, where you had sufficient ceiling only to, to, to be able to see the ground and where, and normally you would attack trains, or military vehicles, or factories, or if you, if you found one, an aircraft on an aerodrome. I've been on a number of Rhubarbs and they're, they were really dangerous. They were really, the losses were greater than what we gained. COs allowed their pilots who were becoming restless and wanted action, they would permit them to go on a well planned Rhubarb. But as I say, I, I was determined, at one time in ‘43, ‘43, November ‘43, I had moved from Kenley to 416 squadron under Chad Chadburn. Have you ever heard of Chad Chadburn, the Wing Commander? Well that was his wing. I persuaded Chad to let me take four pilots into the Zider Zee, we were then in a, in Lincoln, Holland was just across the North Sea, where the German two-engined fighter bombers were being trained. They were, they were attacking the coast, coastal shipping, in the Atlantic, the North Sea, with guns, with cannons, and with torpedos. They did their training, we heard from Intelligence, in the Zider Zee, and so I thought, "Well when the weather's bad we could, it's not that far, we'll take, we'll go in and we'll catch them, unknown, they, they won't expect Spitfires to be in the area and we'll shoot a whole lot of them down," stupid idea. But anyway, I persuaded Chad that, to let me go. He insisted that I take another four and they should be at the, at an aerodrome on our coast, to come up if I needed help. Well I, the, the navigation was very important, it went across the North Sea at wave top level and the winds changed, you don't know exactly what the wind is, and I had a silhouette map, a long map which showed the towers, churches all along the coast, the area I was headed for, and I knew exactly where we should hit the coast. The, the information we had from Intelligence about the location of German guns was, turned out to be wrong, because there were guns everywhere along the coast. So when we went speeding across Holland after, just a few minutes I, my aircraft was hit, 20 millimetre cannon shot, got hit by aircraft, blew, exploded behind the armour plating, and I hadn't any radio, I had, I had, the motor continued but I didn't have, I had very few instruments no compass, and so I waved to my number two to take over, thinking he would. But he, I didn't know how badly I was shot up and he and the other three saw these big holes in my aircraft and they thought well I wouldn't, I wouldn't, I'd never get back home so they wouldn't go on, they wanted to lead me back home. So I tied myself along with Danny Noonan, who took over and, but they expected that I'd be, they reported that we were coming back home and they'd got the others flight out to, to, to alert the air sea rescue when they saw that I was bailing out or, I didn't. I got across, I got back to the air, airfield. That's a Rhubarb. That was a stupid Rhubarb because we could all have been shot down, really. We might have done some damage, but it wouldn't have been worth it to lose four aircraft and shot down a couple of bombers but we had no idea that the whole Dutch coast at that time in November ‘43, they were expecting the invasion. They didn't know, but there were a lot of evidence pointing to the Dutch coast as being the area where the, the landing would take place. So the whole coast line was, was just a mass of guns everywhere, there was no, there was no clear channel that I had planned.

Description

Mr. Sager explains the specifics of a "Rhubarb" mission and goes on to tell about a "Rhubarb" he planned that didn't work out as he thought.

Arthur Hazelton Sager

Mr. Sager was born in Hazelton, BC, where his father was working as a medical missionary. He was the eldest boy in his family, growing up with two brothers and four sisters. He and his family were pacifists (against war). Mr Sager quit school at age seventeen and went to work in a gold mine. At the outbreak of war Mr. Sager was living in London, England, working as a professional actor, as well as a reporter and had the opportunity to interview Jews and other people that had fled mainland Europe. The stories he heard from these people led to the changing of his pacifist attitudes. Mr. Sager also had two brothers who served, one in the Royal Canadian Navy and the other in the Royal Canadian Air Force. Mr. Sager joined the RCAF and flew many combat missions over Europe. He had a very successful career earning the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) with bars, and his flying record at the end of the war stood at six destroyed, two probable and five damaged. By the end of the war, Mr. Sager was made a commanding office After the war Mr. Sager also had a distinguished career as a private citizen. Among his many jobs, he spent twenty years working for the United Nations as Project Manager for developing countries, as well as a member of the Executive of the Royal Canadian Air Force Association.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 05:47
Person Interviewed:: Arthur Hazelton Sager
War, Conflict or Mission:: Second World War
Location/Theatre:: Europe
Branch:: Air Force
Units/Ship:: 416, 421, 443 Squadron
Rank:: Flight Commander
Occupation:: Pilot

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Rhubarb Missions

Heroes Remember