John McMullen

John McMullen.

John was born in Manchester in 1923 and lived later in Blackpool. At 18 he volunteered for the Fleet Air Arm. After initial training he began flying training in England and three months later went to Canada. Six months later he was awarded wings and commissioned as a Sub Lieutenant.

Having completed training on fighters and undertaken six deck landings he was appointed to 882 Wildcat Squadron

aboard HMS Scorcher, an Escort carrier.

The ship was to be engaged in escorting convoys carrying supplies to Gibraltar for N.Africa before which the Sqdn. was stationed in N.Ireland. After several convoys the ship moved in to the Mediterranean and the Sqdn was based in Malta to form part of an assault force destined to take part in the invasion of Southern France.The objectives, apart from supporting the landings, was to prevent movement of the German Panzer divisions.

The task force consisted of three carriers and a cruiser and bombardment spotting, destruction of airfields and Me 109s was part of the plan as well as dive bombing bridges and railway installations. The operation lasted eight days after which the ship sailed to Alexandria before moving into the Adriatic where operations were carried out to support the occupation of the Aegian Islands.

In November 1944 the ship returned to Scapa Flow and the Sqdn was ashore in Orkney, from there the next operations were against shipping and shore bases in the Norwegian sea areas and the fiords. Whilst in the Baltic the war finished.

John's next posting was to HMS Battler, another Escort carrier, which was training deck landing officers. Aircraft flown included Wildcats,Hellcats,Corsairs and Swordfish. At this time he experienced engine failure in a Wilcat and was forced to ''ditch'' but was picked up by a merchant ship after about half an hour.

Training fighter direction officers from an airfield near Milford Haven then followed until demobilisation in August 1946 after which he studied Economics and Commerce at Manchester University until 1948 graduating with a BA(Com).

In order to continue flying he resigned his RN commission and joined the RAFVR to do five years of ''weekend flying''

which resulted in being mobilised for three months during which time he flew Spitfires and Vampires as a Flight Lieutenant before being ''demobbed '' again.

He had flown 728 hours in daylight and 24 at night and had completed 128 deck landings by day and 6 at night.