1619494 LAC David Clark RAF

David (Dave) Charles Clark, fourth son and eighth child (of eleven) of Godfrey Charles Clark, dairyman and later refuse collector, of 35 Murray Road, South Ealing and his wife Ethel, only daughter of William James Lester, engine driver at the gas works, was born in Brentford on 19 December 1922. On 21 February 1917 at Hounslow, Middlesex, his father enlisted in the Labour Company of the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment.  One of Dave’s elder brothers, 6348704 Private John Herbert Clark, 2nd Battalion, Queen’s Own Royal West Kent Regiment, was killed in action in Burma on 1 January 1944 and is buried in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery at Taukkyan, Yangon (formerly Rangoon), Myanmar. His gravestone reads: Loved in life; Treasured in death; A beautiful memory all we have left.

Dave explained: "There were too many of us for my parents to look after – eleven altogether – and we only had a flat, so I spent four years in a home run by nuns. I was the only one who was sent away and it was a hard time because I was often beaten.  When I came back home, I went to Little Ealing Boys’ School. I just had to learn what I could and have no memories from those days. After leaving school at fourteen, I went to work in a shop. There were three shops, all in a row in South Ealing and all owned by Charlie Herapath: a wood shop, a wallpaper shop and a tool shop [Charles J. Herapath of 23 Ealing Park Mansions was described in the 1939 Register as a builders’ merchant]. I worked in the wood shop and learned carpentry: it was an apprenticeship, I suppose. I learned to make windows, doors and cupboards and I was paid five shillings a week. It was a lot of money then. Although I had to pay my parents for food and lodging, I still bought lots of sweets, I remember.

"I worked in the wood shop until I was eighteen. Although I tried to join the Royal Navy at one stage, they said that I was still too young. The war had just started and I had to do something and I fancied the Navy. Eventually, though, I enlisted in the Royal Air Force at Acton and they gave me a medical. After basic training at the recruitment training camp at Padgate [near Warrington in Lancashire], I was posted to the former Butlin’s Holiday Camp at Filey in North Yorkshire [which had been requisitioned on the outbreak of war and renamed RAF Hunmanby Moor], where I was trained as an Air Gunner group V. I also did some training with the Army as an infantryman. It was a period of my life which I wanted to forget because it wasn’t very nice: I was always being shouted at and told what to do.  The RAF Regiment was formed on 1 February 1942 and I was assigned as airstrip defence at RAF Cardington in Bedfordshire. In 2802 (Field) Squadron, there were two infantry flights and one air defence flights.’

Mosquito fighter-bombers and Halifax heavy bombers were based at RAF Gravely in Cambridgeshire, just 15 miles from Cardington, where Dave explained that his carpentry skills were put to good use: "I used to make sections for the wings and fuselages for Mosquitos and I also made plywood drop-tanks." The Mosquito, nicknamed the ‘Wooden Wonder’, was largely of wooden construction and plywood drop-tanks were fitted under their wings for long-range reconnaissance missions. His youngest daughter, Vicky, said: "Ironically, Dad also had a motorbike and sidecar as his first vehicle and we were all transported around in it for many years. His first sidecar was from a converted fuel tank [which was some seven feet long] but he part-exchanged it for a ‘safer’ one for Nan, Mum and us children to be transported in!"

Dave continued: "I came home on leave from Cardington with a one day’s pass but there was no-one at home – so I went to see my sister, Frances. She worked at a munitions factory in Park Royal and I knew where I could find her. Her friend at work was called Sophia and she introduced the two of us. I thought: ‘She’s got nice legs.’ We used to go to the pictures together at The Lido in West Ealing and we went dancing at the Hammersmith Palais: most of the cinemas in those days had dance floors. She was a good dancer, you know.  While in England I also did a motorcycle despatch rider’s course [which was to come in very useful later after his discharge]. Very soon after we were married, I sailed from Southampton in the Johan Van Oldenbarnveldt [a 20,238 gross tonnage Netherlands Line Royal Dutch Mail ship, which could carry up to 4,000 troops] to Bombay. After a period at Woril [just outside Bombay (now Mumbai)], we were crammed into aircraft and flew across India to Secunderabad, the Overseas Depôt for the RAF Regiment."

From there, the new arrivals were posted to the airfield at Feni, close to Chittagong (now Chattagram), in what is now Bangladesh. Feni was less than thirty miles south of Comilla, Headquarters of the Fourteenth Army. 2802 Squadron was also based at Agartala, a similar distance north of Comilla. As the Fourteenth Army advanced south, the Squadron moved initially to Meiktila and then to Toungoo, before establishing themselves briefly at Pyu and then Pegu, and then moving west to Hmawbi and finally to Mingaladon, just north of Rangoon. On 15 September 1945 – exactly a month after the Japanese surrender – there was an article in the Straits Echo & Pinang [sic] Gazette, a section of which was headed ‘The Great Burma Drive’. Dave sent it to Sophia, writing, ‘Read This Darling’: ‘At Meiktila, against overwhelming odds, they were flown in to keep the Allied aircraft flying, though Japanese had to be cleared from the airfield daily. Later, there came the lonely, arduous and gruelling work in defending RAF installations outside Army lines. It was only fitting that, on the triumphal entry into Rangoon, the RAF Regiment should have been amongst the first troops to occupy that city.’ Dave explained: "We were equipped with the Bofors 40 mm L/60. There was a crew of three: No. 1 used to fire it; No. 2 did the elevation and No. 3 did the traversing. I was a No. 2. It’s a period of life I try to forget all about." The newspaper was a rare survival, as Vicky explained: "Unfortunately, he insisted in putting all their wartime correspondence into Mum’s coffin, otherwise we’d know a lot more."

Dave continued: "After the war ended, I went to Singapore and then to Penang [an island off the north-west coast of Malaya]. We weren’t really doing much but there was still a lot of bull, though. That When I was at Penang, they asked for volunteers to go to Hiroshima. There weren’t any volunteers – so men were selected. Roy Crouch and I agreed that, if either of us drew the short straw, then we’d both go together. Luckily, we never went. 2802 Squadron was disbanded and I joined 2962 Squadron, in the Light Anti-Aircraft role: we now had two air defence flights and one infantry flight and were sent to Batavia (now Jakarta) to support the Dutch authorities in their fight against the insurgents. There was an incident when someone else took over my duty and was standing on the wing of an aircraft when he was accidentally shot and killed. It could have been me. In April 1946, I took part in a parade to celebrate the birthday of Princess Juliana of The Netherlands [who succeeded her mother as Queen of The Netherlands in September 1948]. While stationed in the Far East, I had two tattoos, one on each forearm: one for ‘Mother’ and the other for ‘Sophia’. They’re both rather faded now, I’m afraid."

On 18 November 1944 at St. Stephen’s, West Ealing, Dave Clark married Sophia, second daughter of Frederick Charles Witchalls, coal porter and member of the Metropolitan Police Reserve, of 63 Elsa Street, Limehouse and his wife Mary, daughter of John Maher, coal porter, of 56 Elsa Street, Limehouse. Her aunt, Sophia Olive Witchalls, after whom she was named, was killed during the London Blitz on 10 October 1940, when on nursing duty at St. Leonard’s Hospital, Shoreditch. The fourth son and the one closest to her in age, 6351554 Lance Corporal Herbert (Bert) Witchalls, 6th Battalion, Queen’s Own Royal West Kent Regiment, was killed in action in Italy on 14 November 1943 and is buried in Sangro River War Cemetery. After the war, Dave and Sophia had five children: what might perhaps be described as the ‘Dave Clark Five’ comprised Brenda, Terry, Philip, Stephen and Vicky.

According to his Royal Air Force Service and Release Book (R.A.F. Form 2520A), 1619494 Leading Aircraftman Clark D. C. enlisted on 15 June 1942 and served overseas from 14 December 1944 till 5 August 1946. On 18 July 1946, Squadron Leader L. W. Crew wrote: ‘His ability and experience as a joiner have enabled him to do many important jobs for his unit. Keen on the work, gives excellent results. Should do well in this trade.’ Discharged from active duty with the RAF on 15 September 1946, Dave was granted 77 days’ leave, during which period he collected his pay fortnightly from the Post Office, The Avenue, West Ealing. Unlike many Servicemen and -women, he didn’t return to his pre-war job; instead, he found work with an industrial washing machine business or, perhaps more accurately, a laundry. Later he had a van, from which he sold Sun Blest bread and Harris’s meats. He also did some carpentry and worked as a painter and decorator. 

Sophia died on 13 March 2018, since when Dave has continued to live on his own, albeit with regular help over the last eighteen months from a series of carers. Vicky and her husband, Steve, a veteran of 10 Para, live in Ower, just three miles from his home in Totton, so they visit him often. His other surviving children live further away, at Ashford in what was once Middlesex, at High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire and at Stevenage in Hertfordshire. Although he wore the medal ribbons while in uniform, Dave never applied for his medals.  Instead, Steve did so on his behalf, just in time for their Ruby Wedding; as well as his Second World War medals, Dave also received the General Service Medal with clasp ‘S.E. Asia 1945-46’ in respect of his service in the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia). Since then, he has been seen on parade in Totton, proudly wearing his medals, every Remembrance Day.