The Airmen's Stories - S/Ldr. J R Kayll

Wing Commander (Squadron Leader during the Battle) Joe Kayll, who has died aged 85, had the exceptional distinction as a fighter pilot of being awarded the DSO and DFC on the same day.
Kayll was credited in the citation for his awards, dated May 31 1940, with having destroyed nine enemy aircraft since May 10, when Germany launched its invasion of the Low Countries and France.
His was an outstanding achievement for an Auxiliary Air Force weekend flier who had arrived in France in November 1939 as a flight commander. His squadron (No 607, County of Durham) was flying obsolete Gloster Gladiator biplane fighters. Based at Merville near Vitry-en-Artois, 607 was fortunate not to be seriously challenged during the ‘phoney war’ of the winter of 1939/40. In his sitting-duck biplane it was unnerving merely to overfly cemeteries from the Great War.

In March 1940 Kayll received command of No 615 (County of Surrey) and on May 2 led it to Le Touquet to re-equip with Hawker Hurricane fighters in place of their death-trap biplanes. But at dawn on May 10 the airfield was attacked and four of 607's spanking new Hurricanes were destroyed on the ground. Back to strength again, the squadron returned to Merville. As enemy tanks supported by Ju87 dive-bombers advanced towards the Channel, Kayll led his gallant band of businessmen, farmers, lawyers and accountants against overwhelming fighter odds. Forced to move from airfield to inadequate airfield as they were overrun, Kayll and his part-timers took off through curtains of falling bombs to fly six or seven combat sorties a day.

On May 20, as Belgian troops blew up the airfield, he flew to Abbeville, assembled a number of still serviceable Hurricanes and strafed enemy forces on the Arras-Douai road. They lost three aircraft to ground fire. The operational record book and pilots' logbooks of 615 were destroyed by a bomb, leaving no record of its exploits when Kayll's depleted and exhausted squadron was withdrawn to Kenley.

With replacement pilots and Hurricanes, 615 was kept busy all that June. One day, returning from a sortie over France, Kayll found King George VI waiting to pin on both a DSO and a DFC. Shortly afterwards Kayll had another surprise when, landing back from France, he found Winston Churchill waiting to dine with the squadron and stay the night. The prime minister's visit provided a timely boost for 615. During the Battle of Britain it fought - with heavy losses - until the end of August, and again in October after a brief spell recuperating at Prestwick.

Joseph Robert Kayll was born in Sunderland on April 12 1914. He was educated at Stowe. But after failing all exams, he started work at 16 as a mill boy in the family business of Joseph Thompson, a sawmill in Sunderland. From 1934 Kayll spent weekends and holidays learning to fly Westland Wapitis with No 607 Squadron. In 1939, called to full-time service, Kayll was posted with 607 to Drem in Scotland. One Luftwaffe bomber pilot shot down over the sea by a 607 Gladiator pilot exclaimed in fluent English:

To be shot down by a bloody barrister in a bloody biplane is more than I can bloody well bear.

Intelligence had led him to expect no more resistance than "a bunch of Auxiliary amateurs".

After the Battle of Britain, during which he notched up several further kills, Kayll was rested on Fighter Command's tactical staff until June 2 1941, when he received command of the celebrated Spitfire wing based at Hornchurch, Essex. Kayll was dismayed on June 25 when the station commander, Group Captain Harry Broadhurst, decided to lead the wing in a daylight raid on France. Fearing this was a fateful decision, Kayll agreed to fly as No 2 to the Spitfire ace and was shot down over St Omer.
Kayll crash landed in a pea field. He was taken prisoner and interrogated by a Captain Eberhart, who told him the Luftwaffe knew about his career from reports published in the Sunderland Echo.

Kayll recalled:

It was most disconcerting. They knew I had performed aerobatics with 607 Squadron at Empire Air Days and had played rugger with 603 at Edinburgh. They even knew I had recently married Annette Nisbet of Harperley Hall.

As a PoW Kayll was involved from the first with escape plans. He was held at Spangenburg, 20 miles from Kassel, a 12th century castle and former hunting lodge of the princes of Hesse. Here he assisted two successful escapes. Further attempts were frustrated by a dry moat inhabited by wild boar which made a commotion when disturbed. The animals proved impervious to potatoes stuck with razor blades, eating them with gusto and no ill effects.

In October 1941 Kayll was moved to Stalag VIB, a former Hitler Youth camp at Warburg. Most of the prisoners were Army officers.

I escaped from this camp Kayll remembered with 10 RAF and 20 Army officers over the wire. The escape was organised by Captain Stallard, who was successful. I was out for seven days before being recaptured by a forester. I was escorted via a Berlin prison to Offlag XXlB at Schubin in Poland. After a period of solitary I helped with a tunnel which started from the lavatory. About 30 got out, but all were recaptured.

In 1943 Kayll was moved to Stalag Luft III at Sagan in eastern Silesia where he was put in charge of escape attempts with Squadron Leader Dudley Craig, a fellow 607 pilot, as his No 2 and Flight Lieutenant Aidan Crawley, the future broadcaster and MP, as intelligence officer. This escape committee's greatest success was the Wooden Horse exploit, in which a makeshift gymnastic horse shielded tunnelling. This resulted in a "home run" made by Flight Lieutenants Eric Williams, Oliver Philpot and Lieutenant Mike Codner.

In the spring of 1945, as the Russians advanced, Kayll and his fellows marched westwards. They overcame their guards and camped at a farm near Hamburg where Russian women slaveworkers, relieved of their forced labour, gladly cooked for them.

Kayll was demobilised in 1946 and returned to the family timber business. He reformed 607 as a week-ender fliers' Auxiliary fighter squadron at Ouston, Northumberland. An enthusiastic yachtsman, Kayll founded the Sunderland Yacht Club.

In 1981, aged 67, he sailed the family ketch Wild Thyme home after his sons Joseph and David had completed the Observer transatlantic two-handed yacht race. In addition to his early war DSO and DFC Kayll was mentioned in despatches in 1941 and appointed OBE in 1945 when he also received the Air Efficiency award.