Flying for Freedom: The Flying, Survival and Captivity Experiences of a Czech Pilot in the Second World War

247 Pages·2008·5.98 MB·English

by  Siska

FLYING FOR
FREEDOM

First published in Great Britain in 2008 by PEN & SWORD AVIATION
an imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, S70 2AS
Copyright © Dagmar Johnson-Siskova, 2008
ISBN 978-1-84415-730-3
Digital Edition ISBN: 978-1-84468-638-4
The right of Alois Siska to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by
any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing.
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Printed and bound in England by CPI UK
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& Sword Military, Wharncliffe Local History, Pen & Sword Select, Pen & Sword Military Classics and Leo
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To the crew of KX-B and 311 (Czechoslovak)
Squadron – our squadron.
Contents
Foreword
Translator’s Introduction
Glossary
Part 1
1 Into the War
Part 2
2 Direction South
3 Escape from the Citadel
4 Next Stop France
5 311 Squadron
6 Night Battle
7 The Long Flights
8 Third Year
9 Wilhelmshaven
10 The Last Raid
11 Shipwrecked
12 Lost Hope
13 Happy New Year, 1942
14 We Fight Death
15 Windmills
16 Terra Firma
17 Prisoners of War
18 Sagan
19 Arrest
20 The Gestapo Move In
21 Whatever Next?
22 Days of Freedom
Part 3
23 Until the Bitter End
Epilogue
Foreword
It is indeed a privilege to provide a tribute to my old friend Czech Guinea Pig
Alois Siska, a man whose bravery has my fullest admiration and respect.
Our flying experiences during the 1939–45 War were similar; we both flew in
Wellington bombers and were both badly injured. We were also patients at the
Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead, Sussex, England and we shared the
same brilliant innovative plastic surgeon, the late Sir Archibald Mclndoe. Both
of us also became members of the world-famous organization, the Guinea Pig
Club.
I was more fortunate than Alois in other respects. My crippled aircraft was at
least able to reach the sanctuary of England where I crashed. I was treated with
kindness, consideration and understanding, while he had the misfortune to crash
into the North Sea. One member of his crew died in the aircraft, while he with
four others clambered aboard a rubber dinghy and drifted for six days. During
this nightmare two crew members died from frostbite, thirst and hunger, and
Alois also had to endure the injuries he received when the aircraft plunged into
the sea.
On the sixth day they sighted land and were able to paddle the dinghy ashore,
but their euphoria ended and turned to despair when they realized they had
arrived in Holland, which was occupied by the Germans.
After four horrible years in captivity Alois was finally freed by the American
forces in 1945, and was eventually sent to East Grinstead for medical treatment
that he had been denied as a prisoner of war.
He returned to Prague in 1947 only to find the incumbent government
disapproved of his escape from occupied Czechoslovakia to fight in the Royal
Air Force, and once again he had to endure all kinds of humiliation.
Alois was a remarkable person who, in spite of the privations, managed to rise
above it all and maintain his courage and pride. For me the highlight of the
Guinea Pig Club’s reunions was the moment when Alois Siska arrived – we
would welcome each other with warmth that only brothers can achieve.
Jack J. Toper MBE
Chairman and Editor of the Guinea Pig Club
Translator’s Introduction
My father started writing this book while recovering from his war wounds in the
Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead immediately after the Second World
War. He returned to Czechoslovakia just in time for the communist takeover of
February 1948, one outcome of which was government censure of all Czechs
who had fought the Nazis from the West, mainly ex-members of the RAF. His
initial manuscript consequently stayed hidden until the early 1960s, when a
temporary political thaw allowed such a story to be published.
The first publication was a labour of love by the entire family. I still
remember my mother typing the pages on Grandpa’s old portable typewriter.
The result, the first edition, was a modest paperback which arrived in the
bookshops of Prague in July 1966 and sold out within days; a hardback edition
in Slovak was published the following year. But after the fraternal help of the
Soviet bloc armed forces in 1968 and the subsequent return of a hardline
government, the book had to be shelved again. It did not reappear until after the
Velvet Revolution of 1989, when ex-members of the RAF were finally
rehabilitated and shown the respect they so richly deserved. The book was
extended to include the post-1948 era to complete the story.
My father originally wrote his story for his own countrymen. For a British
readership a direct translation would have represented certain difficulties, so he
glossed over some specifically Czech anecdotes, as they would be common
knowledge to all Czechs but nonsensical to a British reader. And my father has
explained at length certain war stories – such as Douglas Bader and his presence
in Colditz – with which most Britons are familiar, but would be unknown to
Czechs. With that in mind, and with my husband’s help, I have adapted these
passages in the book to make sense to all.
For me, as a translator, this is the end of a very long road. My father’s story,
and that of other members of his squadron, has been part of my growing up. And
for Mum and me, 311 Squadron became our squadron – cherished, respected and
held in awe. It was my father’s dream to have his book published in England, the
country which became his second home. We agreed but sadly Dad died before
this translation could be completed.
Dagmar Johnson-Siskova
Glossary
Part 1
Sokol – Czech physical education organization established in 1862 by Tyrs &
Fugner to promote physical and spiritual well-being amongst the mass of the
population.
Part 2
Gooseneck – Part of the flare path along a runway.
POW – Prisoner of War.
‘Roll out the Barrel’ – This is actually an English version of the chorus of the
Czech song ‘Skoda Lasky’, composed by Jaromir Vejvoda in 1910.
SBO – Senior British Officer.
The Good Soldier Svejk – A novel about an incompetent Czech soldier before
the First World War, written by Josef Chapka.
Part 3
CPK – Flight Simulator.
CSPB – Czechoslovak Union of Anti-Fascist Fighters was a civil organization
formed in 1948 by joining together various resistance units from both the First
and Second World Wars.
ICAO – International Civil Aviation Organization.
JZD – Co-operative Farm.
LNP 1 – 1st Auxiliary Air Force Group.
LNP 2 – 2nd Auxiliary Air Force Group (stationed in the town of Ceske
Budejovice in southern Bohemia).
LVA – Air Force Academy (military).
MNO – Ministry of Defence.
MNV – Parish Council.
Narodni Fronta – Formed in Moscow in 1945 whose main purpose was ‘to unify
and coordinate general political awareness of all citizens in accordance with
the programme of the Communist Party’.
OBZ – Military Intelligence renamed the Fifth Department after the coup of
1948. Used the nature of their work as a cover for political purges against
anybody the new regime disapproved.
ONV – District Council.
ONV – District Council.
OVS – District Military Council. Dealt with all military personnel matters on a
district level.
SDL – Civil Aviation Authority.
SNV – Night Vision School.
TPZS – Technical Fire & Rescue Service.
ULZ – Institute of Aviation Medicine.