British Modern Military History Society

THE first talk this month will be on Tuesday, February 7 at 7.30pm via Zoom.

Tudor Rees will talk about one man’s war in the Battle of the Atlantic.

The month of May will officially mark the 80th anniversary of the battle, a theatre of global conflict that Churchill acknowledged as vital to our ultimate victory.

During the first two years of the battle the Allies were singularly ill-prepared and naive against a determined and powerful enemy and losses were high.

The Allies needed to innovate and succeed at many levels — intelligence, tactics, co-ordination, weaponry and technology.

One of the key tactics introduced by the Royal Navy to deal with the U-boat threat was the small “escort carrier”, operating a complement of aircraft in the anti-submarine role protecting North Atlantic convoys.

Tudor will focus on the experiences of his father, an observer flying in a Swordfish while serving in 825 NAS. The famous squadron reformed late in 1942 after the ill-fated “Channel Dash” sortie.

Using his father’s flying logbook and assisted by additional research at the Fleet Air Arm Museum and elsewhere, Tudor will describe the personal experiences of one RNVR observer on the front line during 1943 and 1944.

The aircrews flew in any and all weathers over a grey, featureless ocean, looking for surfaced U-boats or periscope trails, freezing in open cockpits in obsolete aircraft.

Finding a blacked-out carrier, a postage stamp in the ocean, using dead reckoning at night and landing on a pitching deck after four-hour sorties required skill, teamwork, concentration and determination. These were brave men and their attrition rate was high.

Tudor is an amateur historian who is interested in the human stories of conflict.

For more information and to register for the talk, visit www.bmmhs.org