Squadron Leader John Martin Griffith-Jones, D.F.C., born Oorgaum, India, 1914; educated at the Imperial Service College Windsor; joined the Royal Air Force, 1937, and was posted as Flying Officer to 214 Squadron (Harrows), Scampton; moved with the squadron to Feltwell and Methwold; converted to Wellingtons with the squadron, and moved to Stradishall, Suffolk, February 1940; at the beginning of April he was posted to 149 Squadron (Wellingtons), Mildenhall, Suffolk; on the 4th April he crashed, 'he had engine failure coming in to land at night and crashed badly; he had a miraculous escape, being thrown through the windscreen, and as far as I can remember there was only one other survivor the rest of the crew being killed when the aircraft went up in flames. This accident shook him up a lot both physically and mentally and he was considerably disfigured, but within a few months [two months to the day] he had fully recovered and was back in the squadron earning his decoration and filling the middle page of the Illustrated London News' (Letter to recipient's father from C/O after his death included in the lot refers); Griffith-Jones naturally played down the severity of his accident to his mother at the time, 'You may have heard from some unreliable source or other that I had a slight accident the other day. Well in case you did - there is nothing to worry about as I only received a slight dose of concussion and a cut over the eye. If you hear the story from someone else it will probably be a decapitated head and both arms amputated!! However I have had a good rest here and hope to get out in a day or two'; having recuperated at the R.A.F. Hospital at Littleport, Cambridgeshire he returned to flying with the squadron on the 5th June; he flew in at least 26 operational sorties with the squadron, including: Hamburg; Bremen (2); Koln; Baden Baden; Hamm (2); 19.7.1940, 'Aircraft Works at Wezendorf (S. of Hamburg) Bombed 7,000ft. Light & Heavy Flak Encountered. Our Aircraft Attacked By Me. 110 40 Miles East of Lowestoft. Enemy Aircraft Damaged - Believed Destroyed' (Log Book refers); Lunenburg Aircraft Factory; Gotha Aircraft Factory; 1.8.1940, Kamen Oil Plant- Griffith-Jones' BBC typescript offers further insight:
'Our objective on this particular night was a synthetic oil plant in the Eastern Ruhr area. When we were briefed for the show, we were told that this was a very important target and that every effort was to be made to locate and attack it. It wasn't too easy a target to find, as a matter of fact... the land-marks which we were given for this were a wood and an autobahn. We were attacking independently and set off from the base at roughly two minute intervals. Some of the other fellows were on different targets. Four of us in the squadron bombed the oil plant all within a period of 35 to 40 minutes and we estimate that the numerous direct hits which we scored and the fires and explosions which broke out must have pretty well wrecked the greater part of the place. The first aircraft to attack bombed about 20 minutes after midnight. The second attacked round about quarter to one. We came third a few minutes later and the fourth aircraft followed us immediately. My navigator did a splendid job of work. We were absolutely dead right when we crossed the Dutch coast going out and we went absolutely straight into the target area...
Going out there was a lot of searchlight activity and there was a great deal of heavy A.A. fire as well as all the light stuff... Having arrived in the area, we were groping, as it were, for the actual target for some time. We knew we were near it all right but our instructions are very definite on this point- that we must identify the target without doubt before bombing. So we dropped parachute flares, but without success. Then, about a minute or two later, while we were still searching, one of the other fellows from the squadron let off his flares about half a mile away on our port side. This other bomber was then about 2,000 feet above us. His flares went off below us lighting up a wide area. They enabled my navigator first of all to spot the wood... and this led us on to the actual target. We now began our attack then, suddenly, the bomb aimer reported "Another stick just burst across the target, Sir"... Our first aircraft had attacked from north to south and started fires also, but apparently they had burnt out or had been got under control by the time the second bomber and ourselves had arrived.
When we saw our aircraft attacking we turned away instead of continuing our run up. Our idea was to lay our bombs across the target at a different angle from theirs so as to plaster it more thoroughly. They had bombed from north to south so we cruised for a few minutes and then made our second run up... We attacked from east to west and our bombs burst across the target almost at right angles to the others. Something new seemed to be catching alight almost every second. We had a Frenchman with us as a member of the crew and he became quite enthusiastic about it. I don't speak French myself but, as far as I could make out he kept saying "il est illumine - il est illumine!"... By now we had been in the area a good twenty five minutes. All this time we were under fire... Some of the shells came pretty close. One or two of them, as a matter of fact, burst alongside the rear turret. We had a goodish way to come back home so we thought we wouldn't play around any more.'
Griffith-Jones carried on with further operations to Collida Aircraft Factory; Hanover; Berlin (4), including 25.8.1940 the first raid on the German capital of the Second World War, '5 Containers Incendiaries. Dropped Over Siemens Works. Very Heavy A/A Encountered Over Berlin & Hanover. Holed In Port Nacelle Tank' (Log Book refers), and 23.9.1940 which was the raid over Berlin that inspired the drawing of his Wellington in the London Illustrated News; Boulogne; Calais; and 20.10.1940, 'Operations Tirpitz At Wilhelmshaven, 8000ft'; posted for conversion to Stirlings with 7 Squadron (the first Squadron in Bomber Command to have four-engine bombers), Oakington, 7.11.1940; having been appointed a Flight Commander and flown a sortie to Rotterdam he carried out what was to be his final sortie, 3.3.1941, for an attack on shipping in Brest Harbour; taking off from Oakington at 18.43, 'he failed to return, with the crew which I had given him in our previous squadron. We haven't the slightest idea what happened to him; the aeroplane was a perfectly good one and I had actually flown his aeroplane on the night before on the same target. On the night that he was lost we sat up until we knew he had no more petrol and the next day we searched for him in the sea... Actions speak louder than words and the fact that I twice secured G-J's posting to my command is the highest tribute I could pay to him. I don't know when you saw him last, but he had become incredibly tough and after his crash disfigured him he looked very fierce indeed. He was a great loss to me both professionally and personally as he was a friend of mine and my wife's.' (Letter to recipient's father from his C/O included in lot refers).
Squadron Leader Griffith-Jones and his crew of seven were originally listed as 'Missing' later confirmed 'Killed in Action', and are all commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial. Their aircraft was the first of the new four-engined types to be lost on an operational sortie.
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