Dear Peter - Do please forgive my astonishment - I am a new member to the forum and was not expecting to see your name pop up !! What an unexpected pleasure. You see, although we have not met - I feel as if we have something in common (even though I was born some 15 years after the war ended). To begin with, I have your book
'Enemy in the Dark' on my bookshelf. It is a very important work for me - not least because so few accounts exist from nightfighter flyers, and particularly as your book so sensitively gives the
German perspective on nightfighters. I can recommend it. Also, you may be interested to know my father was doing the same job as yours, but on the Allied side. Hence the strange feeling that Isomehow
know you. I should explain my
'old man' is Wing Commander Doug Oxby (RAF retired - as he's now 85). He served against you guys as a Nightfighter Nav/Rad flying Beaufighters and Mosquitoes (1940-1945). For your interest - I'm including an extract from Rawnsley & Wright's book
'Night Fighter' (Published 1957) which describes him quite well. I'm certain he'd be delighted to meet the former enemy - even after 60 years - I'm quite certain you two would have lots to chat about ! He's alive and well, but now living in Toronto, Canada. Anyway here's the extract :
Extract (Page 358-359 Night Fighter CF Rawnsley & Robert Wright. Collins Publishers 1957)
No. 219 Squadron, which had been transferred to 85 Group, and which had come over to France early in October (1944), was now commanded by Peter Green, promoted to the rank of Wing Commander. He had as his navigator, Grimmy having gone on a rest, Flight Lieutenant D.A. Oxby, one of the most successful navigators in the business. Only recently they had shot down during one patrol three Stukas which had been trying to dive-bomb the bridge over the Waal at Nijmegen.
Douggie Oxby was young, slightly built, with a twinkling, almost roguish eye, and a keen wit that seemed always just about to bubble over. I could well imagine that in the air his commentry would come rippling over in an exuberant but unflurried stream.
I asked Douggie if they had had much trouble with the Stukas over speed. He admitted that they had had to put their wheels and flaps down in order to stay behind the slow and old dive bombers, and that even then had nearly shot past them. And they would have shot down a fourth but for the fact that it fired off a cluster of white regcognition signals right in their faces, dazzling them, and forcing them to turn away.
In his time Douggie had flown with quite a variety of pilots. He had been with a night squadron in the Western Desert, and had seen a lot of activity over Tobruk. He had also served on Malta, again on night operations. "That was a game!" he commented when he told me about it. "We were equipped with Mark VIII A.I. (radar) while we were there, and we were so short of juice that every operator was considered to be operational after one twenty minute practice." I thought of the long weeks we had spent struggling with the stuff, and I remarked that they could not have been of much use after only that much practice. Douggie laughed. "We did four sorties from Luqa the same night," he said. More cautiously I asked what luck they had had. "One destroyed and one probable," he said. "Both Heinkels. The probable was one of those annoying blighters that won't burn. We chased it down from twelve to one thousand feet, and used all our ammo on it, too." It did not seem to strike him as anything of an achievement to get two visuals and combats straight off the reel with completely strange equipment. There was only a vague regret that they had not properly fixed the probable.
Douggie went on, flying now with Peter Green, to pile up what was I believe, the record score by any (Allied) night fighter navigator. He produced thirty-six visuals on enemy aircraft, which resulted in twenty-six combats. Of these, twenty-two were definitely destroyed, two were probably destroyed, and two were damaged. He was given a Permanent Commission in the RAF after the war, and his decorations included a DSO; a DFC and a DFM and Bar. One of the aircraft Peter Green and Douggie destroyed was shot down while they were on only one engine, the other having failed during the chase. And once, when they were close behind a Ju88 over Munchen Gladbach, there had been no response at all from the cannon when Peter tried to open fire. Having had the same thing happen during the time I was flying with John Cunningham, I could sympathise with him.
"It gives one rather a naked feeling, doesn't it ?" Douggie commented.
Peter, the opportunity to chat to you has been a rare pleasure for me. Not quite as nice as meeting you in person, but almost ! Best wishes.
Yours sincerely
Richard Oxby
Contact email
richard.oxby@btinternet.com