Bill Ballard

Bill Ballard – Bill was a chronic complainer, but he did this in such a manner as to make us laugh. Bill was sitting at lunch one day chuckling away, yet making intelligent cracks about the terrible food (comparatively good food actually), and remarking to us poor sword-carriers that he would be enjoying his coffee while we would be labouring shortly over distant France. (His kite was unserviceable at the time.) Poor Bill, to his chagrin, his Spitfire was put on the line and he had to go with us. The only pilot lost that afternoon was Bill. In spite of things, we had to laugh because we felt sorry for Bill, probably having to search for something to eat in Northern France while we had come home to a not-so-bad dinner.

We found out, later on, that Bill was a prisoner-of-war. But the wonderful nut, evidently, had been hit badly and he died not too long after we received the prisoner-of-war news.

Wing Commander Douglas ‘Dogsbody’ Bader used to hog the RT (radio telephone) as, after all, he was the leader, and could afford to, but, in my opinion, it was DB who shot Bill down. I was not able to call Bill because two pilots talking over the RT simultaneously jammed or garbled the transmission. I, also, was waving to him like mad, but I think that he didn’t see me. I broke over the top of Bill and his No. 2 man but they evidently didn’t get the drift of what I was trying to do. Bader landed at Westhampnett later on, and he wanted to know about Bill. To the surprise of those present, and the Englishman’s pride of protocol, I walked over to Bader and said that, in all due respect, he shot down Bill Ballard. My goose was cooked with the authorities over me, and especially with DB. I felt exhilarated.