The Airmen's Stories - F/Lt. C P Green

Charles Patrick Green, always known as 'Paddy', was born in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa on 30th March 1914, the son of Major Charles Green (1882-1917) and Ruth Graham Green (nee Parry 1888-1965).

**************************************

Charles Henry Green was commissioned in the 1st Battalion South Staffordshire Regiment in 1901 and saw service in the Boer War following which he served with the West African Frontier Force until 1908.

In October 1914 he was posted to France with the 7th Division and fought in the First Battle of Ypres, being seriously wounded and mentioned in dispatches.

Once recovered, he was sent to East Africa where he was attached to the 3rd Battalion of the Nigeria Regiment. In fighting at Mkwera, Tanganyika (now Tanzania) he died of wounds on 8th November 1917.

He was buried in Mkwera Cemetery but the graves became lost and he is now commemorated on a memorial wall at Dar-es-Salaam Cemetery.

**************************************

Paddy Green was at Harrow School from 1927 to 1932 and then at Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating in 1935. He became a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (FRGS) later in 1935 after spending most of the year in the USA.

After returning to England, he became a member of the British bobsleigh team which won bronze in the 1936 Winter Olympics and won two gold medals in the world cup four-man events in 1937 and 1938. A silver medal in the two-man event in 1938 followed plus another silver medal for the four-man team in 1939.

He was also in the British ski team at St. Moritz in 1937 and broke a leg when skiing in the Presidents Cup.

Green had learned to fly in California and joined 601 Squadron, Auxiliary Air Force on 28th February 1937. He took his first flight with the squadron that day in a Hawker Hart.

Training followed on the Hart, its two-seat variant the Hawker Demon and the Avro Tutor. He was awarded his flying badge on 19th September 1937.

Above: prewar fun at 601 Squadron.

He was briefly transferred to 79 Squadron which operated as the Operational Conversion Unit for the Gloster Gauntlet, returning to 601 Squadron which had switched to this type in November 1938. In March 1939 he underwent further conversion training on the Airspeed Oxford in preparation for 601 Squadron to be equipped with the Bristol Blenheim. In April he was allocated Blenheim L6618 (UF-M).

Called to full-time service on 24th August 1939, Green was promoted to Flight Lieutenant in command of 'A' flight of the newly forming 92 Squadron at Tangmere.

Over the next months, he flew a wide variety of aircraft, including the Hind and Fairey Battle, before returning to the Blenheim. In February 1940 he began flying the Harvard and Miles Master preparing for 92 Squadron to be equipped with Spitfires.

He flew solo in the Spitfire on 8th March 1940 and began flying patrols from Hornchurch on 23rd May.

Above: with his 92 Squadron colleague F/O AC Bartley.

Over Dunkirk on 23rd May 1940 he destroyed a Me109 but was then himself shot down in Spitfire N3167, an armour-piercing bullet hit him in the leg. Using his fingers to staunch the bleeding, he turned up his oxygen to full to avoid passing out and landed at Hawkinge.

This injury kept him off operations until 1st October 1940, when he rejoined 92 Squadron, then at Biggin Hill.

Through his friend Max Aitken in 601 Squadron, Green was introduced to Aitken's father, Lord Beaverbrook, and his sister Janet. She invited him to convalesce at her house in Henfield, Sussex, which was a haunt of other off-duty airmen. Green, often confined to his bedroom, was convinced that he had a rival for Janet's affections in F/Lt. (later Air Commodore) RG Dutton of 111 Squadron and he would fire warning shots from his service revolver whenever he saw Dutton walking up the drive.

He was posted away on 7th October to form and command 421 Flight at Hawkinge. During a spotting flight on the 12th Green was jumped by Me109s. He baled out, wounded in the neck and arm. He landed amid a number of aggressive young bulls but was rescued by men of a New Zealand artillery battery whose medical officer treated his shrapnel wounds, he was then admitted to hospital. His Spitfire, P7441, crashed at Coldbridge, Boughton Malherbe in Kent.

Green resumed flying on 1st November 1940 and he destroyed a Do17 on 25th November, got a probable Me109 on 5th December and shared in the probable destruction of a Do17 on the 27th.

421 Flight was re-numbered 91 Squadron on 11th January 1941. It was briefly commanded by S/Ldr. Hopcroft before Green took over on 18th January 1941.

Awarded the DFC (gazetted 18th April 1941) Green was posted away in June. He starred in the film 'First of the Few' filmed at Ibsley in Hampshire later that year, cast as the pilot of a He111.

On 29th August 1941, Green flew his first flight in the Bristol Beaufighter and went solo on 13th September. On 13th October he was sent to 54 OTU for night fighter training, flying Airspeed Oxfords and Blenheims. He was posted to 600 Squadron on 14th November to command 'A' flight, which flew the Beaufighter II, a version powered by the Rolls-Royce Merlin engines instead of their normal Bristol Hercules, a combination he said was "the most dangerous aircraft to fly that was ever made".

In December 1941 he punctured his ear drum which led to another short grounding. In early 1942 he was sent to the No. 1 Blind Approach School and then returned to 600 Squadron on 11th February.

On 2nd June he was made Wing Commander and sent to 125 (Newfoundland) Squadron at Fairwood Common.

On 10th December 1942, Green was once again posted to command 600 squadron, which by this time had moved to Maison Blanche Airport in Algeria (now Houari Boumediene Airport).

He was ferried there on 24th December by Dakota and B-17. On arrival, he rejoined his former radar operator, F/O RJ Gillies. The squadron operated during the closing stages of the campaign against the Afrika Korps around Tunis.

During this time the squadron won a number of battle awards, leading to the nicknames 'The Black Knights', 'The Fright in the Night' and 'The Gong Squadron'.

On 5th May 1943, Green and Gillies shot down a Ju88 during a dawn patrol. The next day he was hit by fire from a destroyer near Bouficha, which led to the aircraft being written off. The squadron then moved to Luqa on Malta. While covering the action during the invasion of Sicily, over a period of three nights in July, Green and Gillies were credited with seven confirmed kills, including four on one sortie.

This led to them both being awarded the DFC (gazetted later in the year on 20th August 1943).

On 5th May 1943 he probably destroyed a Ju88. On 25th June 1943 Green took 600 Squadron to Luqa in Malta, for the invasion of Sicily. On 9th July he flew Lt. Gen. (later Field Marshal Lord) Montgomery and General ‘Boy’ Browning to inspect the 1st Airborne Division.

The invasion of Sicily started the next day and Green destroyed a Ju88 and a He111 on 12th July 1943.

He was awarded the DSO (gazetted 29th July 1943).

On 11th August he claimed a Ju88 and a probable He111 on 9th September. After the successful Allied invasion of Italy, the unit moved to Salerno on 23rd September. During this time the squadron had gained such a fearsome reputation that their presence would be announced in the Allied press.

Green destroyed a Ju88 on 25th January 1944, his last combat.

In February 1944, Green was promoted to Group Captain, serving with 1 Mobile Operations Group of the Desert Air Force before going on to command a wing of Douglas Boston bombers.

He was awarded the Order of Patriotic War 1st Class (USSR) (gazetted 11th April 1944) and the DFC (US) (gazetted 28th July 1944).

On 5th November he was posted to command 232 Wing, a composite unit flying Spitfires, Fairchilds, Bostons, Dakotas, Mosquitoes, Sea Otters, Proctors, Ansons, Oxfords and a Vickers Warwick.

At the end of the war, his record stood at eleven confirmed kills, three probables and four damaged.

He remained in the RAF post-war, with his last flight in an active squadron on 12th August 1946. He was then posted to the Central Fighter Establishment to help develop jet fighter tactics for the Gloster Meteor.

He was released in 1947 as a Group Captain and returned to South Africa with his wife Ruth, a Canadian nurse he met in Italy in 1946. He worked for the South African division of Anglo American PLC before retiring in 1977.

Green and his wife then retired to a farm in Collingwood, Ontario, Canada, near her childhood home in Owen Sound. Ruth died in 1981 and Paddy on 10th April 1999, aged 85. They had a son and two daughters.

Additional research courtesy of Doug Tidy.