Battle of Britain Sunday

[Gunner]

The Swords and Ploughshares Museum participated in Canada's National Battle of Britain Sunday Parade on 19 September.

It was a quiet event, held at the National Aviation Museum and featured the Past, the Present and the Future (RCAF Veterans including some of 'The Few', current serving memberof the Air Force and Royal Canadian Air Cadets all on parade together.

The minute of silence was punctuated by a fly past of the Mynarski, VC Lancaster Bomber, a Harvard (representing the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan), a flight of Griffon Helicopters in missing man formation and a two ship sortie of CF 18's. Michael Potter regretted that his Spitfire was unable to join the flypast this year, unfortunately it is still under repair after dropping its landing gear into a hole and bending the prop at an airshow in Genesee this summer.

A cool, sunny day with a strong breeze made the parade participants comfortable on what is normally scorching tarmac and the vets set the example to the younger generations by all remaining on parade for the whole show (a number of the young cadets succumbed to heat and tension and fell out).

Our 40mm Bofors Light Anti-Aircraft Gun was on parade to represent the army's contibution to the Battle of Britain. Many Light and Heavy Ack Ack batteries of the Royal Canadian Artillery joined thier airborne fellow Canadians in holding Hitler's Luftwaffe, and his plans for invasion, at bay during those difficult months in 1940.

We were pleased to be able to participate and flattered by the attention the vets and the audience paid to the gun after the parade marched off. The Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, Maj Gen Dumais, and his Command Chief Warrant Officer were kind enough to come over and thank our volunteers for thier efforts.

It was sobering to note that for the first time since I have started participating in this event that the 100 man Guard from the Air Force outnumbered the veterans. In Eric Bogle's immortal words, "...and year after year, thier numbers get fewer.... someday no one will march there at all" (The Band Played 'Waltzing Matilda')

We will remember them!

Mike

[Gunner]

Photos didn't stick. One is 379kb and the other is 251kb. Help : Mike

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally posted by Gunner
Help : Mike

E-mail them to me and I'll stick them up.

Hanno

[Gunner]

Thanks Hanno. On thier way. Cheers, Mike

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Here they go, with captions provided by Mike:

"'Sergeant' Jules Deschenes and 'Bombardier' Nathan Griffiths guard their Colours, a 40mm Bofors Light Anti-Aircraft Gun during the Canadian National Battle of Britain Sunday parade held in Ottawa on 19 September 2004. RCAF 'Corporal' Chris VanKoppen, looks on. All three are volunteers with the Swords and Ploughshares Museum of Kars, Ontario."

[Hanno Spoelstra]

"A Commonwealth Air Training Plan veteran, a Harvard, flies past the Battle of Britain Parade, Sunday 19 September 2004. The gun is a 40mm Bofors Light Anti-Aircraft Gun from the Swords and Ploughshares Museum of Kars, Ontario."

Well done, Mike!

[Tony Smith]

I discussed this with Keith the other night, and I hope I'm not veering too far from the topic of this thread.

It is often referred to on this site (by Canadians) that the training scheme of aircrew from all parts of the Empire to particpate in the air campaigns over Britain and Europe was the "British Commonwealth Air Training Plan" or BCATP. It's a term not heard of before in Australia. In Australia, the same programme of training was known as the "Empire Air Training Scheme" or EATS. Is there some misunderstanding here, or is this just some reference to some smaller portion of the overall training. Typically aircrew were trained in Australian Air Training Schools in rudimentary subjects of navigation or pilot training in Tiger Moths before shipping out to Canada for conversion to larger aircraft and molding into crews (often of mixed nationality ie Aust, NZ, Canadian, Brit , South African), before moving across to Merry England.

Does EATS only refer to the basic training in Aust, or are we seeing two names for the whole scheme?

[Gunner]

Good question Tony.

I have a book about the plan and I'll dig it out this weekend to see what it says. There is a BCATP Museum in Brandon, Manitoba. Check out thier website at: www.airmuseum.ca

Cheers, Mike

[John McGillivray]

There is a history of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan online at the following link.

http://www.forces.gc.ca/hr/dhh/downl...erodrome_e.PDF

My father was in the RCAF during the Second World War. He was based at Summerside P.E.I. Here is a photo of him taken on the 14th of Jan. 1941.

[Tony Smith]

An AWM search finds no reference to BCATP. There are plenty of references to EATS in records and photos like:

006470
Place made: Amberley
Date made: 3 March 1941
Physical description: Black & white
Summary: Group portrait of RAAF members of Canada 8, Empire Air Training Scheme (EATS), prior to their embarkation. Left to right, back row: Alexander (Blue) Herschel; unidentified; Les Chippendall of Brisbane, Qld; unidentified; Nugent Walsh of Brisbane, Qld; Ted Holloway (missing in action, lost off Malta). Middle row: Edmund McCormack of Merino Downs, Roma (killed on active service near Cairo); unidentified; Terrance Knot (Paddy) Archer of Rockhampton, Qld; George Wood of Tarragindi, Qld; unidentified. Front row: Noel Cowan of Brisbane, Qld; unidentified; Andy (camp Cassanova) Taylor of NSW; unidentified; unidentified; 404106 Flight Sergeant Murray James Lavery of Brisbane, Qld

Even major temporary displays at the AWM in Canberra such as one a while ago on Bomber Command, plainly describe the programme of training as the "Empire Air Training Scheme".
:

[Stellan Bojerud (RIP)]

Nice picture of the Canadian Bofors on Battle of Britain day!

Here is another one:

Originally posted by Stellan Bojerud
Nice picture of the Canadian Bofors on Battle of Britain day!
Here is another one:

Very good, even Mr Churchill came along for the demonstration hence the gun crew in full and tidy kit plus a very shiny gun too.

R.

[Gunner]

To avoid any confusion about wheel sizes, etc, I should point out that our gun has custom made mud-guards so as to meet highway code requirements for a trailer... we used the NATO M series lights as they are nice and bright while still looking nice and martial. The mud-guards are easily removed to return the gun to its original looks when and if needed.

I have the original wheels and tyres stored indoors with 10 pounds of air in them should we need to put them back on for special displays. The current wheels are 16 inch Chevy truck rims with custom machined centres and radial retreads which allow me to tow the gun at modern speeds on the highway.

The Ontario Highway traffic act defines towed artillery as "devices" which require all applicable lights, etc but do not need to be licence plated as the load is permanent and not removeable. The Bofors is plated as I made the error of explaining to the lady at the motor vehicle licencing bureau that it has seats... If it has seats its a trailer and required the plate! Lord preserve us from the 'gummint' bureaucrats!

Cheers, Mike

[Tony Smith]

So which empire were we in?

See book on e-bay

Originally posted by John McGillivray
There is a history of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan online at the following link.

http://www.forces.gc.ca/hr/dhh/downl...erodrome_e.PDF

My father was in the RCAF during the Second World War. He was based at Summerside P.E.I. Here is a photo of him taken on the 14th of Jan. 1941.

Very nice photo of your Dad John!!!

Karmen

[Gunner]

Hi Tony (and other Diggers who might read this!):

I was chewing on the difference in names and it strikes me that it may have been something as simple as Canada preferred the term British Commonwealth to the term Empire and 'Scheme' was adopted because EATP didn't sound as good as EATS (or even that the Canucks didn't want "Bee CATS" as an acronym.

I bow to air force scholars for the true answer to this starnge use of two names for what was in essence the same training plan.

Cheers from sunny Florida (a diving holiday that has seen me diving on M60A3 tanks at 65 feet... a US Army artificial reef full of big grouper or potato cod as the Aussies call 'em!)

Mike