Milne Bay veteran meets an old friend, AWM Kittyhawk with Nat Gould 92 yrs

[Luig]

I'll claim NAT as RAN FAA :D

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/breakin...o-1226579379887

Milne Bay veteran meets an old friend
by: Max Blenkin, AAP Defence Correspondent February 16, 2013 12:51PM

"At a spritely 92, Nat Gould, is one of a diminishing few, perhaps the last of those Australian pilots who flew operationally during those desperate days of the Battle of Milne Bay.

That was the pivotal battle in August and September 1942 when Australian troops, supported by the RAAF's 75 and 76 Squadrons, turned back a Japanese landing on the eastern end of New Guinea, Japan's first defeat on land of the Pacific War.

Mr Gould visited the Australian War Memorial on Saturday to renew acquaintance with an old friend, P-40 Kittyhawk A29-133, named "Polly", which he flew at Milne Bay.

This wasn't his usual Kittyhawk. Polly belonged to Flight Lieutenant Buster Brown and was named after his girlfriend.

"For various reasons you might stand down and have a rest day or the aeroplane is unserviceable and you fly someone else's aeroplane. Polly I flew a number of times operationally," he said.

"I owned another one called Vodka."

Why Vodka, you might wonder.

It stems from Mr Gould's experiences as one of a small number of Aussie pilots who served in RAF squadrons sent to Russia in response to a plea to Britain for aid.

Mr Gould said he had flown Hurricanes and Spitfires in Britain but found the Kittyhawk somewhat agricultural, concurring with the view of a fellow pilot who described it as akin to flying a bulldozer with wings.

"I can't say I learned to love a Kittyhawk but I learned to admire it and be grateful for it because it could take a lot more punishment than a little Spitfire," he said.

Mr Gould flew from Australia to Port Moresby and then to Milne Bay, arriving a few weeks before the Japanese. In one mission against Japanese ships, he encountered rain and low cloud and terrifyingly heavy anti-aircraft fire.

He dropped his bomb on what he thought was a Japanese troopship. To his surprise, he was credited with sinking a small flak ship. Somehow that was recorded as the Japanese flagship, which apparently endures in some accounts of the battle.

In subsequent missions, he strafed Japanese landing barges and Japanese marines who stood waving on the beach, apparently in the belief that they would only see Japanese aircraft.

As the Japanese troops advanced, the Kittyhawks conducted repeated missions.

"You couldn't see the enemy. You would just strafe the jungle. At the next debriefing the army would telling us that we killed hundreds of them," he recalled.

"Then you would come back and land and rearm and refuel and have a pee on the tailplane. That was a good luck thing. Sorties would only be 10 minutes because the Japs weren't far from the end of the strip."

At the War Memorial, Mr Gould encountered another old friend, the Hawker Sea Fury on display in the Memorial's aircraft hall, which Mr Gould flew in operations during the Korean conflict."

[Luig]

Commander Nat Gould RAN 14 December 2010 by Geoff Raebel

http://www.raafinrussia.com/commandernatgouldran.html

Commander Nat Gould RAN prepared for the Fleet Air Arm Association website

"In researching for my book the RAAF in Russia, I came across a Russian troop’s magazine with an RAF Sergeant Pilot on the cover. More work turned up the book RAF in Russia written in 1941 about 151 Wing’s Russian expedition with Hurricanes.

It left out a lot. Like in the convoy was HMS Argus, the 1918 progenitor of all aircraft carriers. With Hurricanes as deck cargo, the approached to within a couple of hundred miles of Murmansk when she flew off the Hurricanes to find their own way to Russia. Two damaged their under carriages on the launching hump at the end of the deck and had to fly wheels down all the way. Other crated Hurricanes were erected in Archangel and flown to Vaenga near Murmansk.

Argus herself, expendable, went home via Norway and “shook up old Jerry” as they went past.

Then I found a photo of the Soviet Ambassador pinning a medal on a chap called Nat Gould. Tracking led me to Schofields Aero Club where Nat had been President. He was gracious and happy to talk. He was a Battle of Britain pilot who at short notice was told to grab his parachute, dinghy and kit and report to 151 Wing. It was all hush-hush. They found they were off to Russia. He was one of four Australian Sergeant Pilots. They flew operationally against the Luftwaffe before converting the Russians onto their Hurricanes.

Nat’s worst recollection was getting out of cold Russia, shipping back to UK on an Arctic Convoy then immediately being posted into the tropical jungle of Milne Bay onto Kittyhawks

Postwar as I remember his story, he transferred to the Navy getting his Commission when the RAN were looking for pilots for HMAS Sydney.

A very potted history of one chapter in my book “The RAAF in Russia” and the side history covering the time before the sinking of the Tirpitz and the RAAF part in that event."

[Luig]

An upgraded RAN Sea Fury PDF with more embedded videos, including one with CMDR Nat Gould talking about deck landing the props he has flown, is here on SpazSinbad on SkyDrive:

In FOLDER: 'Various RAN FAA Aircraft PDFs':

https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=cbcd63d63407...6340707E6%21438

FILENAME: 'RAN_Sea_Fury_pp210.pdf' 94Mb

The smaller version of this PDF does not have the named video clip.

This post has been edited by Luig on Feb 20 2013, 01:35 AM