Battle Under The Moon

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{detailed description}On the night of May 3rd/4th, 1944, RAF Bomber Command mounted a medium-strength attack on a German battle-tank depot and military barracks at Mailly-le-Camp, south of Rheims in Northern France, as part of the 'softening-up' process for the D-Day landings. Bomber Command objectives in France were regarded as "soft" targets, and, as such, were rated as only a third of an operation. There was no reason to suppose that Mailly would be any different — until disaster struck.
Some 362 bombers — Lancasters and Mosquitos from Nos. 1 and 5 Groups, supported by Halifaxes from 100 Group — took part in the raid. But, as the author says, "that a planning staff could contemplate, or a commander countenance, any plan of action in which a possibility existed — even a remote one — of several hundred fully-laden Lancasters orbiting a marker, in bright moonlight, within striking range of at least four night-fighter bases, staggers the imagination...But that is a criticism formed with the advantages of hindsight." It is clear that, at the time, no-one saw reason to expect disaster.
The tragic end to the story is that Bomber Command lost 42 Lancasters that night (11.6% of the force employed, an unacceptably high rate of loss), and 255 aircrew lost their lives. Some fifty escaped by parachute, and the author is generous in his praise for the members of the French Resistance who helped over half that number to remain at liberty.
In his summing-up, Jack Currie reflects, "What has to be remembered about Mailly-le-Camp is that, with all hell bubbling up around them, and their fabric of existence hanging by a thread, the great majority of captains and crews gritted their teeth and waited for the order. In that, they won a greater battle than the one for which they had been briefed. And when, at last, they were allowed to turn their sights towards the target, there were no more malfunctions and no more mistakes. Then the bomber crews kept faith with their tradition, and with their comrades — with the fifty thousand who had died or were to die in other battles, and with those who were to fly on until the war was won."
{Author / Publisher / Date}by Jack Currie
published by Air Data 1995 1st edn. 192pp illustrated, index, appendix, bibliography 16x24
{condition}mint, inc. d/j.
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