Soon after turning 18½, Johnnie Houlton received his father's approval to enlist in the RNZAF as a trainee pilot. His training commenced at the RNZAF Training Wing, Flight 3A, Squadron 1, in Levin, which is about 95 kilometers north of Wellington. He then progressed to the RNZAF No. 3 Elementary Flying Training School in Harewood, Christchurch, and completed his training at No. 2 Flying School in Woodbourne, located 8 kilometers west of Blenheim. Johnnie proudly earned his Flying Badge on October 18th, 1941. The assessment occurred the morning following a late-night celebration at the Officer's Mess, with Johnnie being the first to undergo the flight test.
The final assessment took place on the morning after a late-night party in the Officer's Mess, and Johnnie was first for the flight test. His assessor deemed him ❛below average❜, commenting ❛ Not much air sense, and does not keep a good look out❜ - during his flight time, Johnnie had twice flown in front of other aircraft.
The RNZAF report from that period revealed that out of 56 trainees at Woodbourne, 16 were deemed unqualified and labelled as ‘wastage’. Among those who successfully qualified, five, including Johnnie Houlton, were put forward for commissions. This group featured Lloyd Trigg, who was killed in action and was awarded both the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Victoria Cross posthumously. The VC was granted posthumously based on the recommendation of the Captain of the U-boat that Trigg had engaged, a fascinating story of courage and honour itself.
Sergeant Houlton left Wellington for the United Kingdom in December 1941, travelling on the troopship 'RMS Rangitiki.' His route took him through the Panama Canal, and he reached England just as Singapore fell on February 15, 1942.
Johnnie's advanced flying training started on March 16, 1942, at No. 17 Advanced Flying Unit in Watton, Thetford, Norfolk. He then moved on to No. 55 Operational Training Unit in Annan, Dumfriesshire, on April 7, where he trained on Hurricane aircraft.
On June 7, 1942, Johnnie was assigned to the 485 (NZ) Squadron at Kenley, where he joined a Spitfire squadron. Unbeknownst to his Flight Commander, Johnnie had never piloted a Spitfire before, but he was given the chance to fly the commander’s personal aircraft, which bore the letters OU-V. He quickly got the hang of it, successfully landing after only two overshoots. His initial month with the Squadron was filled with practice flying and convoy patrol duties.
Early in July, the Squadron was taken out of Eleven Group and sent to the RAF station at Kingscliffe for a six-month rest period. There, they continued to engage in practice flying and convoy patrols. On July 11th, he experienced his first air-to-air attack near Ostend, Belgium. After successfully evading enemy fire, he and his No. 1 discovered a train and destroyed the locomotive. During this attack, Johnnie was unaware of the turbulence caused by the lead aircraft's slip-stream, noting in his logbook for 11 July: “1 locomotive destroyed 1 damaged. Left (side) pitot head and port light [of his aircraft] in a tree.”
As July was coming to a close, there was a call for volunteers for missions based in Malta. Johnnie, who had long been intrigued by the battle of Malta, decided to step up and offer his help.
In early August, Johnnie made the move to No. 185 Squadron, arriving just in time for their perilous journey to Malta aboard H.M.S. Furious as part of Operation Pedestal. His logbook details the sacrifices made during this crucial mission to deliver supplies to the besieged island: “H.M.S. Eagle sunk; also 4 cruisers, 8 destroyers, and 10 of 14 merchantmen.” (17 August 1942). The siege conditions on Malta took their toll on Johnnie who, in October, spent “31 weeks in dock, dermatitis + tonsillitis + sandfly fever”. As he later observed in his autobiography 'Spitfire Strikes':
Fresh water was in short supply and there was no hot water at all; which made hygiene a myth … while we were half-starved, the mosquitos, sand flies, bed bugs and fleas fed very well.
Cleared for action by the end of October, he was one of four pilots selected to bomb the Gela aerodrome in Sicily on November 28, with their Spitfires outfitted with appropriate bomb racks. On their return from the raid, they spotted eight Ju. 52 transports heading to North Africa, and Johnnie continues the story:
I attacked in turn each of the three aircraft on the left of the formation, starting with the rear one. As the 20mm. guns fired only one round, I had to do the best I could with the four .303 machine-guns - and was surprised by the amount of return fire from the formation. At least some of the aircraft had upper gun turrets, and it also appeared that some irate passengers were using automatic weapons through the windows. The first Ju. 52 dropped below the formation and turned towards Sicily, and the next two were still descending steeply towards the sea when the Me. 109 escort came diving down, and I ducked into a handy cloud. About one week later a telephone call from Headquarters advised that 'Y' Service had confirmed at least one Ju. 52 crashing into the sea.
German records that later came to light established the loss of three Ju. 52s from this flight.
In December 1942, Johnnie Houlton returned to Britain to join a newly formed Search and Rescue Squadron in Scotland. However, he was soon requested back for operations and was assigned to 602 Squadron at the end of January 1943. Just three weeks later, he received permission to rejoin 485 Squadron, where he participated in sweeps and bomber escorts. When the Squadron relocated to Biggin Hill on July 1, 1943, and upgraded from MK V Spitfires to MK IXs, the pace of operations picked up significantly. By mid-August 1943, Johnnie was commissioned and achieved his first confirmed 'kill' (an FW 190 on August 27), along with a shared kill (another FW 190 on September 16) and a further damaged aircraft (an Me 109 on the same day).
No. 485 Squadron - Successive Spitfire Strikes - D-Day's First 'Kill'
In August 1943, Johnnie was promoted to Pilot Officer and achieved his first victory on the 27th when he shot down a Fw 190 near St. Pol. He chased the enemy aircraft for 30 miles, diving from 27,000 feet down to ground level. During the pursuit, the Fw 190 hit a power line and crashed. It was a harrowing experience for Johnnie, who almost lost consciousness after his Spitfire was put through a series of sharp turns due to a new modification to the aircraft's elevator:
I was virtually cemented in position, as it was physically impossible to lift hands, feet or head against that amount of 'g' (force), and we just kept careering around in a steep, left-hand descending turn; like winding down a giant, corkscrewing spiral.
Two or three weeks later - on 16 September - he took a half-share in another Fw 190 over Beaumont-le-Roger and damaged a 109. Once again, the pilot of the Fw 190 proved a worthy opponent, the pair of them leaving vapour trails that resembled ❛a crazy pattern of irregular white arcs and angles❜ in their wake - ❛the amount of g we were both pulling in the turns was dragging hard, my own vision hovering between grey-out and black-out.❜ Johnnie continues:
As his turn rate momentarily slackened at the stall in a steep turn, I managed to pull through his flight path to fire a short burst which produced a flurry of bright strikes on the wing-root. As the 190 pilot flicked away into an opposite turn he flew right into Bert's line of fire, and a short burst smashed the aircraft down into the woods with a great shower of debris.
The Squadron was now ordered to Scotland for a rest, but it resumed operations out of Hornchurch in February 1944, as part of 2nd Tactical Air Force (T.A.F.).
The Spitfires in the squadron were modified to hold a 500 lb bomb beneath their fuselage, and in the six weeks prior to D-Day, Johnnie Houlton flew a total of eleven dive-bombing sorties. On one flight, his bomb malfunctioned and, against orders, he chose to return to base instead of ditching it in the ocean. This decision resulted in reprimands from both the squadron and airfield commanders.
Towards the end of April 1944, Air Transport Auxilary pilots flew i a batch of brand new Spitfire IXs, to re-equip 485 Squadron ahead of the D-Day invasion. Johnnie selected an aircraft from the new arrivals for air-testing.
Intent on checking that the Spitfire would maintain absolute stability at the highest speed likely to be reached, Johnnie midsguidedly let the vertical dive continue much too far. Despite his many hours logged, he had never heard of 'Mach Numbers' or 'the Sound Barrier'; nor of any serious problems in controlling a Spitfire in a high-speed dive. On the other hand, he had read a 1943 article in the Air Ministry Intelligence Bulletin which briefly reported on problems being experienced by P47 pilots when pulling those heavy, high-powered aircraft out of a fast dive. It appeared that very heavy elevator forces and strange control responses were being experienced, and this phenomenon was referred to as 'compressibility'. The bulletin quoted these instructions issued to P47 pilots encountering compressibility ❛...take one and a half turns back on the tail crank - and pray❜.
In July 1985 I was able to fly again in ML 407, in England, during the filming of "The Perfect Lady", the Spitfire commemorative film produced by T.V.S. This was a very moving experience, made even more memorable by the fact that my old aircraft again carried the markings and insignia of OU-V, precisely as they were in May of 1944 (2nd T.A.F. Spitfire - The Story of Spitfire ML 407, refers).
Johnnie managed to regain control of the Spitfire, landing it with fairly minor injuries. Because the aircraft was brand new and unstressed, the fuselage sustained minor damage. The wings, however, were severely buckled with twisted wing tips and buckled skin.
The following day, April 9, 1944, he opted for another aircraft: the legendary ML407. This was Johnnie's third OU-V, and this time the 'V' held special significance: 'V' for 'Vicky', ❛the girl I met after returning from Malta, who all the 485 boys were a little in love with, and who became my wife.❜
The second OU-V that Johnnie piloted was also an LF.IXe, registered as MH350. He flew it from August 1943 until June 1944. A year later, it was transferred to the Royal Norwegian Air Force's 332 Squadron, where it was called AH-V, and later moved to 331 Squadron RNoAF, taking on the designation FN-M. Nowadays, you can check it out in the Military Aircraft Hall at the Norwegian Aviation Museum, Bodø, Northern Norway as FN-T.
In June 1944, the squadron was stationed at Selsey, which was the closest airfield to the Normandy beaches. On D-Day, they were tasked with performing four patrols starting at first light. Before the first patrol, the propeller of his aircraft, ML407/OU-V, was damaged after hitting a desk that an Operations officer had moved onto the airfield. Fortunately, it was repaired just in time for the afternoon patrol.
Johnnie Houlton’s historic role as the first Allied pilot to shoot down an enemy on D-Day is best recounted in his own words:
In mid-afternoon [of D-Day] I led Blue Section during the third patrol of the day. South of Omaha beach, below a shallow, broken layer of cumulus, I glimpsed a Ju. 88 above cloud diving away fast to the south. Climbing at full throttle I saw the enemy aircraft enter a large isolated cloud above the main layer, and when it reappeared on the other side I was closing rapidly.
Our aircraft were equipped with the gyro gunsight which eliminated the snap calculations and guesswork required to hit a target aircraft - especially one in a reasonably straight flight path; and it also enabled the guns to be used accurately at a far greater range than before. I was well aware, however, that most pilots were sceptical of the new instrument and preferred to use the conventional type of sight, which was still incorporated on the screen of the new sight. Normally one would open fire at ranges below 250 yards; but I adjusted the gyro sight on to the target at 500 yards with a deflection angle of 45-degrees, positioned the aiming dot on the right-hand engine of the enemy aircraft, and fired a three-second burst. The engine disintegrated, fire broke out, two crew members bailed out and the aircraft dived steeply to crash on a roadway, blowing apart on impact.
Supreme Headquarters nominated the Ju. 88 as the first enemy aircraft to be shot down since the invasion began, putting 485 (N.Z.) Squadron at the top of the scoreboard for D-Day. Some days before the invasion I had casually suggested we should run a sweepstake for the first pilot to shoot down an enemy aircraft after the invasion began, and I duly collected a few shillings from the pool. When we later had time to unwind and celebrate, my modest winnings were well short of the cost of the party.
His aircraft of this period - Spitfire LF.IXe ML407 OU-V - has subsequently been converted to a two-seater and refurbished. He was consequently awarded the D.F.C.
Two days later, west of Caen, he shot down a 109 which crashed into a wood - ❛Just before crashing an object came away but not a parachute❜ (his combat report refers). He promptly followed up this victory by destroying another 109 in a combat on the 11th, the enemy aircraft catching fire, breaking up and crashing in a cornfield. On this occasion, however, ❛At the height of about 600 feet, the pilot was thrown clear and his parachute opened❜.
His final encounter over Normandy took place on the 29th, when he damaged a 109 south of Caen.
In late July 1944, Johnnie received a temporary assignment to the Ministry of Aircraft Production, where he introduced the new Gyro gunsight that his squadron had helped create. He was relieved to return to 485 Squadron in August 1944, now part of the 2nd T.A.F's 135 Wing, and flew to an advanced airfield in France on the last day of the month. After a series of missions, Johnnie was finally given some time off and attended the Fighter Leaders' School and the Central Gunnery School, later serving as an instructor at a Spitfire O.T.U. for a couple of months.
Johnnie was awarded a DFC in September 1944
