On a Wing and a Prayer
by
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Carlton called ‘Good hunting everyone. Spread out but watch for any escort.’
James looked around him, saw David Bowness and his Section lift from below climbing out to his port side. Carlton lead them in a climbing left turn, positioning the Flight for an attack on the raiders’ stern. James could now make them out more clearly. Two waves of them. Dorniers and Heinkels. The Dorniers higher up and further out. He pulled his goggles down, set his guns to fire. Carlton was aiming Red Section for the Dorniers, Bowness lead his Section toward the Heinkels.
The Hurricanes drew closer, still no sign from the “Jerries” they had been spotted. What was up with them? Were they all asleep? James constantly craned his neck, searched the sky. Where’s their bloody escort? Where are they? He started to pick his target, a slight adjustment of the aileron, a touch of right rudder, he fought to keep the nose down, adjusted the deflector sight. Suddenly they were rumbled; the disciplined wave of bombers trembled and broke. In an instant there were aeroplanes breaking away, weaving, rolling, diving, and climbing in every direction. As James pressed his trigger, his target veered sharply away, James’s tracer streamed harmlessly past its tail-plane. Cursing, he hauled his machine hard over to his right after another. As he did so, firing an instinctive two-second burst as a swerving bomber fleetingly swept by directly in front of him. A shower of empty shell cases clattered down on his canopy as its pursuing Hurricane fired furiously. James continued to chase his Dornier. It was in a spiralling climb, desperately seeking some cloud cover. James put on emergency power and closed. He briefly glimpsed a blazing Dornier plunging vertically down over to his left. His Dornier’s belly began to fill his gunsight and he gave a two-second deflector burst. Simultaneously, his Hurricane shook and jumped violently. He was deafened as cannon shells exploded all around him. ‘Shit!’ In his mirror the merest glimpse of the yellow nose of an Me109 - the escort had “bounced” them. In an instant James threw his Hurricane onto its back and rolled out in a steep turn to the right. He felt himself blacking-out with the force of “G”. Quickly, he tried to negate the effect - his vision began to clear and he leveled out to see the Me109 swooping down past him. His cockpit was now full of fumes and the stench of cordite. Streaming sweat welded his mask to his face, the rasping of his breath loud and magnified.
The smell of the rubber mask and his own belching filled his nostrils and lungs. Still shaking, he quickly checked his controls and dials - oil pressure and water temperature higher than they should be. Looking out of the cockpit he saw a series of jagged holes towards the leading edge of the port wing. He took a gulp of oxygen. The desperate wheeling and circling of aircraft had drawn the dogfight closer to the coast. James was still a bit disorientated and guessed it was Southsea lying directly ahead. He looked down and way below a Heinkel was heading directly for it. Another quick check to see all was well with his Hurricane and James banked and dived after it.v
The Heinkel crew must have seen him, for its pilot put the bomber into a dive. James’s altimeter read 22,000 feet, his airspeed increasing and increasing. Still the Heinkel dived, still heading towards the coast. James was closing fast. As he cut through the air the slipstream screamed past his canopy. He fought to bring his plane’s nose down enough to get a good sight of his foe. With James still about 450 yards behind, the bomber dipped his starboard wing near-vertically and turned sharply out of his gunsight. ‘Damn!’ James cursed. ‘This one knows what he’s doing.’ The Heinkel was turning directly towards him and climbing steeply. James swallowed to clear his ears and hauled hard back on his stick, at the same time kicking down on full rudder to roll over and try to turn inside the Heinkel. His joy-stick shuddered in his palm.
‘Red 2! Red 2!’ Screamed a voice over his radio. It was the South African Eddie Pietersen. ‘Two Me’s behind and diving on you.’
James put his Hurricane into a left-spiraling turn, two orange streams of cannon shell arched by just in front of his canopy.
The South African shouted again. ‘I’m on their tail Red 2.’
The air displacement as an Me109 and chasing Hurricane zoomed past close by, temporarily caused instability to James’s aircraft. Quickly though he regained control continuing his steep turn. Suddenly, the whole world around James seemed to implode as the second Me109’s shells thudded home and exploded all around his cockpit with the sound of smashing glass and Perspex. Fragments tore and flew away from the fuselage, engine cowling and wing surfaces. Hurricane “D” fell into a vicious spin, the joy-stick was snatched from his hand and wobbled crazily and uncontrollably. After, for what to James seemed an eternity, he managed to bring the Hurricane under some sort of control. Some of the dials in front of him had been shattered, others quivered meaninglessly and useless. With relief he realised he couldn’t smell fire - his and others worst fear. The Merlin engine, though, was making a weird grinding noise, power was dropping fast. Oil, grease and some other fluid was beginning to stream back and coat the windscreen. There was a strange odour, the legs of his flying suit and his lap were drenched with something - looking down James was relieved to see it wasn’t blood but a pungent cocktail of glycol and oil. Thank goodness, he would very soon be over the coast. His Hurricane was now getting more sluggish and sloppy by the second. He tested his controls and prayed…
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About the Book
On a Wing and a Prayer is mainly set as the Battle of Britain is raging fiercely in the skies above Great Britain. The novel is principally the story of James Graham, a young Fighter Pilot in daily combat during the Battle when RAF Fighter Command fought to repel the massive might of the German Luftwaffe. The novel describes James’s apprehension and fears of being the “new boy” on the Squadron and, as the Battle of Britain progresses, finding himself at the heart of the daily, fierce, aerial combats, whilst also struggling to come to terms with the harsh realities of war when he sees so many of his comrades paying the ultimate sacrifice.
Through passages of vividly descriptive, exciting, action-packed and thoroughly researched narrative, the story takes the reader—as if in the cockpit with James during dogfight action—from when he joins his first Squadron to when he becomes an experienced and seasoned Fighter Pilot.
On a Wing and a Prayer also provides a fascinating insight into the lives of ordinary citizens in wartime Britain during 1940: factory workers working for the war effort; evacuees finding themselves away from their homes in unfamiliar surroundings; emergency and rescue workers risking their lives daily in Blitz-ravaged London; housewives coping with wartime shortages and rationing. On a Wing and a Prayer will resonate with a wide audience by focusing both on the domestic and the conflict aspects of the war. Through the novel’s characters, the juxtaposition of the life of a Fighter Pilot and the anxiety, fear and hardships of civilians during the Summer of 1940, On a Wing and a Prayer weaves a compelling and poignant story of Britain and its people as they awaited, indeed expected, to be invaded and over-run.
Action, excitement, romance and tragedy are skillfully woven throughout the novel. Mixed in with this all, On a Wing and a Prayer also combines a rich and credible narrative exploring and examining the disparate relationships of the novel’s principal characters each experiencing the stresses and emotions of everyday life in wartime Britain from different perspectives.
On a Wing and a Prayer is the first part of the enthralling Graham Family saga by C. S. Peters.
Keep a lookout for the second novel in the series Ever Present Danger.
About the Author
Before turning to writing plays for the stage and novels, C. S. Peters spent the majority of his earlier working life as a technical editor with a multinational company. More latterly, he has worked extensively as an historical researcher in various fields. Currently, he lives in the Chiltern countryside outside London with his wife and family.