Horace Spencer Wills Fordyce RAAF (1914 - 2008)

Ancestors

Biography

Horace Spencer Wills 'Bill' Fordyce was born on 30th March 1914 in Black Rock, Victoria, Australia. He was the son of Alan Fordyce and Ethel Wills. ^[1]

On 20th August 1940 Bill was commissioned in the Royal Australian Air Force. Posted to the No. 458 Squadron, Bill became a pilot of one of the Wellington bombers. ^[2]

Shot down over the Mediterranean Sea in July 1942, Bill became a prisoner-of-war, held sequentially in the Italian Campo 78, Campo 21 and Campo 78, before being incarcerated in the German Officier Lager (Oflag) VA and Stalag Luft III (famous for the March 1944 Great Escape). Bill had been caught in the tunnel during the mass escape. ^[3] Upon repatriation to Australia following victory in Europe, he was discharged on 25th October 1945. He was issued the campaign and service medals, 1939-1945 Star, Atlantic Star and Australia Service Medal 1939-1945.

Putting the worst of the war behind him, or as best he could, Bill married June Vinton in 1946 in Victoria. ^[4] They had met on the homeward voyage. Bill later admitted that tension in his marriage was his fault, that a 'lot of the problems that we had were caused by my attitude'. He never really overcame the trauma of captivity, responding in 2002 when asked how long it took him to settle back to civilian life, "What's the date today? ... I haven't recovered yet." ^[5]

After his training, his ship from Canada to Britain struck an iceberg but was towed back to Canada. He was transferred to another convoy and his ship completed the crossing, although others in the convoy were sunk by German boats.

After more training in England on Wellington bombers, Fordyce was posted to Malta, then to Egypt, when he and his crew found time between the serious business of war to have fun "buzzing" the caretakers of the pyramids, often blowing their tents away.

He returned to Britain in the battleship Archer, before going back to the Middle East via Gibraltar. Flying at low level at night off Egypt, his Wellington was attacked by two Me-109s and his tail-gunner shot one down. In turn, the Wellington was shot down, and the tail-gunner killed. When the rest of the crew clambered into their dinghy about 8 kilometres from shore, the remaining Me-109 pilot strafed them, sinking the dinghy and injuring some of the crew. The survivors swam to shore, where they were captured and made prisoners of war. Aware the German camp was likely to be bombed by the RAF, Fordyce and his crew dug a trench, but when the attack came that night some American POWs jumped into their trench, forcing Fordyce and others to leap into a latrine trench. After the raid, Fordyce emerged with his crew, filthy but alive; all the Americans had been killed by a bomb on their trench.

Lady Luck had not finished playing her hand. Fordyce, an officer, was segregated from his crew of enlisted men, who were put on a ship that was sunk by the RAF en route to a POW camp in Italy. None survived. Fordyce made it to POW camp CC78 at Sulmona in Italy, where he spent 18 months before being transferred in 1943 to Stalag Luft III near Sagan, now Zagan in Poland, 160 kilometres south-east of Berlin.

There, he used his artistic skills to make maps, forge documents and sew guards' clothing to be used by escapees. He drew No. 86 in the camp ballot that determined the 200 Allied airmen to make the escape, which began on the night of March 24, 1944. Soon after Fordyce entered "Harry" - the other two tunnels being "Tom" and "Dick" - he found himself trapped. By now it was about 5am on March 25, and a guard had noticed escaper No. 77 bobbing up out of the escape shaft; the tunnel had fallen short of the adjoining forest.

Fordyce spent a hair-raising time backing up in the 40 centimetre-square confined space of the 102 metre-long tunnel as German guards fired rifles and machine pistols down the shaft leading to the tunnel, and the tunnel itself. But the ingenuity of the design, with its slight curves, prevented him being hit.

Fordyce was the last man out of the tunnel. The team in the escape hut at the entrance to "Harry" were surprised by a tapping noise after they had replaced a stove above the shaft. He was quickly dusted down and returned to his hut; his captors never knew he was on his way out. Most of the others who went before him were not so lucky.

Of the 76 men who had crawled through to initial freedom, only two Norwegians and a Dutchman completed their escape. Hitler was so enraged that he ordered all the recaptured POWs be shot. His deputy, Hermann Goering, fearing reprisals against his Luftwaffe aircrew held by the Allies, intervened to save some - but not before the Gestapo had murdered 50 of the recaptured men, including five Australians. Fordyce was separated from his wife June, whom he met on a ship returning to Australia in 1945, and whom he married in 1946. He is survived by his son Christopher, who lives in France with his wife Violette and their son Ugo, and his daughter Jane and her daughter Lily.

Sources

Gerry Carman - Sydney Morning Herald - Obituaries - 20 Feb 2008

1. ↑ Victoria Birth Index #16676/1914; registered at Sandringham
2. ↑ Department of Veterans' Affairs nominal roll: 400396 Flight Lieutenant Horace Spencer Wills Fordyce; accessed 21 Jul 2021
3. ↑ POW Memorial Ballarat; accessed 21 Jul 2021
4. ↑ Victoria Marriage Index #17896/1946
5. ↑ Alexander, Kristen. 'Wartime Issue 95 Winter 2021: The Legacy of Captivity; accessed 21 Jul 2021