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The important Fall of France, Battle of Britain and Defence of Malta D.F.C. and Bar group of eight awarded to fighter ace Squadron Leader D. W. A. Stones, Royal Air Force, whose remarkable wartime career is recorded for posterity in his popular autobiography, “Dimsie”: on joining the Colonial Service after the War, he responded in the affirmative when asked whether he was a good shot. “Birds or buck?” he was then asked. “Neither,” he replied. “Men.”
Distinguished Flying Cross, G.VI.R., with Second Award Bar, the reverse of the Cross officially dated ‘1940’ and the Bar ‘1942’, with its Royal Mint case of issue; 1939-45 Star, clasp, Battle of Britain; Air Crew Europe Star, clasp, Atlantic; Africa Star; Burma Star; Defence and War Medals; Malta 1939-45 War 50th Anniversary Medal, mounted as worn, very fine and better (8)
£20000-25000
D.F.C. London Gazette 4 June 1940. The original recommendation states:
‘This officer accounted for five enemy aircraft between May 11 and May 20. He was indefatigable in his search for enemy aircraft, and on May 11 he was in the air for eight hours. I recommend him for the immediate award of the Distinguished Flying Cross.’
Bar to D.F.C. London Gazette 10 April 1942. The original recommendation states:
‘This officer has been fighting the enemy in a day squadron in England and Malta, and latterly in No. 1453 Malta Night Fighter Flight, since May 1940, with gallantry and determination. On 4 June 1940, he was awarded the D.F.C. for the destruction of three and half bombers and two fighters. Since that date he has destroyed three bombers and three fighters in England [mainly in the Battle of Britain] and over Malta has destroyed one-sixth of a bomber by day and a half of a bomber by night, making a grand total up to date of 11 and one-sixth confirmed destroyed and six probably destroyed by day, and a half confirmed destroyed by night.
He has shown conspicuous gallantry and has pressed home his attacks to a successful conclusion with an utter disregard for his own safety and by his quiet bravery and good shooting has set a splendid example to others.’
Donald William Alfred “Dimsie” Stones was born at Norwich in June 1921 and was educated at Ipswich Grammar before joining the R.A.F. on a short service commission in May 1939. Converting to Hurricanes at 11 Group Fighter Pool, he joined his first operational unit, No. 32 Squadron, at Biggin Hill in February 1940. He was just eighteen, and quickly acquired his lifelong nickname “Dimsie”, when a children’s book Dimsie Goes to School, was found in his greatcoat pocket. The book, he explained, belonged to the youngest member of the household on whom he was billeted.
The Fall of France
In March 1940 Stones moved to No. 32's Biggin Hill neighbours, No. 79 Squadron, and following the German attack on the Low Countries on 10 May 1940, he went with them to France as part of the reinforcement to the Advanced Air Striking Force. On the 14th, when patrolling a line between Louvain and Namur during the Army’s short-lived advance towards the Belgian frontier, he had his first contact with the Luftwaffe in the shape of three Ju. 88 bombers. In his memoir Dimsie, Stones relates:
‘They were in a wide V formation and I heard [P.O.] Lew [Appleton] shout: “Tally Ho!” [Sgt.] Harry Cartwright and I went after two of them and Lew disappeared, presumably after the other which had broken formation. We dived on our two. For the first time I felt the joy of firing my guns in hot blood and at a range of about one hundred and fifty yards I saw my rounds flashing into the 88’s port engine and his rear-gunner firing tracer at me. The 88 started to turn to port and slowed down so suddenly that I overshot him and I shouted to Cartwright to finish him off.
I now pulled out the emergency boost-plug for the first time ever, which gave the Hurricane its maximum speed of just over 300mph, and went after the leader of the 88s. The old fixed-pitch Hurricane was quite fast when really wound up and I gradually overhauled this 88, having still some extra speed from our initial dive, but it seemed ages before he filled my reflector sight. Adrenalin was now pumping into my blood stream and I tried to remember to give only short bursts and make them tell. First his port engine was smoking and I thought I could see his airscrew windmilling. Again I overshot, and did a hard steep turn down above him and saw he was in a spin. I straightened out and saw him go into the west bank of a river, which I discovered later was the Maas. I felt nothing for him, only satisfaction and victory.’
Credited with a Ju. 88 destroyed and a half share in another, Stones added to these first successes four days later when ordered to take off alone from No. 79’s base at Merville in a factory-new Hurricane to avoid being bombed on the ground. Climbing rapidly to join what he perceived to be Hurricanes escaping from a raid on Vitry-en-Artois aerodrome, he was shocked to find that his would-be friends were in fact twin-engined Me. 110 fighters. He unlocked his gun button, ‘fired wildly’ and ‘with the luckiest burst of the war’ hit one. But, as Stones added:
‘There was no time to see how badly, as his friends now fell on me from all angles and I dived for the ground. I pulled out at about 100 feet and a 110 I hadn't seen following me down suddenly appeared bang in front of my nose and only fifty yards ahead, having actually gone under me and overshot, climbing to avoid some buildings. He went into a left turn and I fired burst after burst into him as I turned with him. We went almost completely round the village, about 100 feet above the rooftops. I remember a church flashing by, and I could see my rounds hitting him in the port wing, engine and cockpit, when suddenly there was silence from my engine and only puffs of white smoke coming out of my exhaust ...’
Moments later Stones crash landed in a field, slicing his head open on the reflector sight. Bloodied but unbowed he scrambled clear and defiantly loosed off a couple of rounds from his Webley automatic after the departing foe. The timely arrival of a British despatch rider provided him with a lift to Vitry where, with German armour reported fifteen miles down the road, the resident squadron was hurriedly packing up against a backdrop of burning wreckage. Amid the chaos an agitated Auxiliary Air Force Squadron Leader ordered Stones to return to his crashed Hurricane and set fire to it, which he duly did before hitching a lift with some retreating ground crew back to Merville.
Next day Stones shot down an HS.126 reconnaissance aircraft patrolling ahead of a large German force in the Tournai area but not without difficulty owing to the Hurricane's superior speed. On the 20th he was credited with destroying a second HS.126 over open ground near Arras. Later the same day his opinion of the middle-ranking officers he had met in France was compounded when the same Wing Commander who had sent him into the swarm of 110's over Vitry ordered No. 79 Squadron's six remaining combat-worthy aircraft to rendezvous with Blenheims coming out from England to bomb the advancing Panzers. If the Blenheims did not appear, they were instructed to engage any enemy aircraft in the area, and failing that to attack the German tanks themselves. Stones recalled:
‘We thought it rather strange that he did not offer to lead us himself, as we had a non-flying C.O. and both flight commanders out of action ... Finding no Blenheims or German aircraft, we had no option but to attack the spearhead of German armour coming up the Cambrai road. We lost two Hurricanes destroyed, one pilot killed [P.O. Dorrien-Smith, a nephew of Marshal of the R.A.F. Lord Trenchard], one missing and four Hurricanes damaged and not officially air-worthy ... I'm sure our .303 ammunition just bounced straight off the tanks below.’
That evening the order was given for the remnants of No. 79 Squadron to return to England, whereupon the squadron's C.O. made ‘a brave recovery from his bowel-trouble and took to the air in a Hurricane, unseating a sergeant pilot who had to return by sea with the ground-crews.’ All in all Stones was ‘angry about France.’
Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain
After a couple of days’ home leave Stones returned to duty at Biggin Hill. On 27 May he took part in a patrol over the evacuation beaches and claimed a Bf. 110 destroyed and a second unconfirmed. Meanwhile, with an undisputed tally of five victories and one shared in a week in France, Stones had been recommended for the D.F.C. The award was announced together with that of a D.F.M. to his regular wing man, Sergeant Cartwright, on 4 June, and was the cause of general celebration in the squadron - Stones and Cartwright becoming the first of No. 79's pilots to be so honoured since the First World War.
Sweeps and bomber escort duties over the French coast became the order of the day, and on 7 June Stones engaged an Me. 109 for the first time, and claimed strikes on it. Next day, after a successful joint attack on an He. 111, he was lucky to return home when a dense sea fog prevented him from re-crossing the Channel and he was forced to land and find fuel.
On 21 June, with the Battle of Britain about to commence, the Biggin Hill mess provided the setting for Stones’ nineteenth birthday party. A week later, and in a break with modern precedent, the King elected to visit Biggin - though several times delayed by air-raids - in order decorate his pilots ‘in the field of battle’. Stones recalled:
‘That was the day Flight Lieutenant Jimmy Davis and Sergeant McQueen were shot down. Jimmy Davis was an American who had been commissioned in the R.A.F. before the war. He was a first class pilot and a great chap. In the afternoon, Sergeant Cartwright, Sergeant Whitby and myself received our decorations from the King. Jimmy, having been killed, wasn't there to receive his. The King asked about the remaining Distinguished Flying Cross on the table. He was told what had happened to Jimmy. He seemed quite moved.’
July opened with the loss of more pilots and the appearance of increasing numbers of Me. 109s, one of which Stones damaged in an inconclusive fight near Dover on the 4th. But on the same day Cartwright was lost, together with a recently arrived C.O. who was the tragic victim of a flight of Spitfires. On the 5th Stones came literally face to face with the enemy when he was asked to interpret for the Hawkinge I.O. at the interrogation of a sole survivor of an He. 111 crew. The German had won a medal at the 1936 Olympics, yet this cut no ice with Stones, who was later to comment, ‘If I had known about the medal, I would have advised him where to store it for the rest of the war.'
On 9 July Stones claimed a Bf.109 (unconfirmed) east of Dover but a few days later No. 79 Squadron was pulled from the line and sent north to refit at Acklington. Stones departed on a navigation course and consequently missed taking part in the repulse, with severe loss to the enemy, of a heavy raid from Norway. His spirits however were lifted by the appearance of a new C.O. who, having discovered from Mess gossip that Stones and another ‘old hand’ were ‘without a single victory over the fair sex in spite of several over the enemy’, told him, “We shall be going back to Biggin very shortly and I simply will not have it on my conscience to see you two killed as virgins. It would be indecent. I shall therefore arrange to take you straight up to Jermyn Street in London and ask Rosa Lewis [of the Cavendish Hotel] to see to your education.” ’
On 27 August, No. 79 Squadron returned to the fray, relieving No. 32 Squadron at Biggin Hill, which was now under frequent and heavy air attack. On the 31st Stones engaged two Dornier 17s, damaging one and sending the other crashing into a field near Newchurch, where it was surrounded by farm workers who made prisoners of the surviving crew members. The leader of the recovery party, who gave Stones the Nazi pilot's goggles and Verey pistol as souvenirs, further confirmed the effectiveness of his shooting by telling him they had had to remove one of the Dornier's gunners from the wreckage in two pieces. Having been confined to aerodrome defence until essential repairs to Biggin’s bomb damaged Ops. Room had been effected, Stones participated in an attack on 4 September on fifteen Bf.110s flying in defensive circle over Beachy Head, and detaching one with a red dragon painted on it nose, claimed it as a probable.
Three days later the squadron was scrambled to intercept a massive raiding force of some 80 bombers building up over Cap Gris, but after an hour on the patrol line there was still no sign of the German armada. The C.O. ordered all but Stones to land and refuel, but before the rest of the squadron could rejoin, a warning was received that the enemy air fleet was fast approaching en route to bomb London. The C.O. immediately led Stones into an all-guns-blazing frontal attack with the net result that Stones was badly shot up by a 109 and sent into spiralling dive with shrapnel wounds to the leg. Unable to bale out due a jammed canopy, he miraculously levelled out and crash-landed at West Malling whence he was taken to Preston Hall Hospital near Maidstone.
He rejoined his squadron a fortnight later at Pembrey, South Wales, but its part in the Battle was largely over – Spitfires with their faster rate of climb having replaced the Hurricanes at Biggin. Stones nevertheless scored a third share in a Heinkel 111 destroyed, 40 miles west-north-west of St. Davids Head on 29 September, on its way to bomb Liverpool. In December 1940 he was given a mandatory “rest” from operations with a posting to C.F.S. Upavon on an instructor's course. He went to No. 8 E.F.T.S. as an instructor in January 1941 but, in plotting his way back to No. 79 Squadron, expedited matters by going to No. 59 Operational Training Unit as an instructor. He rejoined No. 79 in May but in July was ordered out by air to join No. 249 Squadron at Takali, Malta.
The Defence of “The George Cross Island”
On 25 July his new squadron was scrambled to intercept an Italian BR. 20 reconnaissance bomber making off with photographs of ships in Grand Harbour. Several Hurricanes tackled the Macchi fighter escort, while Stones and five others dealt with the bomber, shooting it down into the sea after the Italian rear-gunner had baled out - unbeknown to his pilot and the rest of the crew. At the end of the month Stones was posted to the newly formed Malta Night Fighter Unit at Takali which, working in conjunction with the search light batteries of the Royal Malta Artillery, provided him with his next victory, a 9 Stormo Cant Z1007 trimotor, shot down on the night of 4-5 September.
Though scrambled regularly against Axis night raiders, Stones and his fellow pilots experienced great difficulty in catching the fast Ju. 88s over Malta. Accordingly it was proposed to try and catch the enemy bombers as they returned to land at their Sicilian bases. As one of the more experienced pilots in Malta, Stones was among those selected for these hazardous night intruder operations which were flown in the M.N.F.U's all-black Hurricane IIs, fitted with long range tanks. On the night of 2 February 1942, he was met with the usual heavy flak at Gerbini airfield and was unable to find an obliging Ju. 88 but shot up a staff car near Modica instead, setting it on fire. After patrolling Catania one night he carried out the additional task of dropping money and other supplies contained in an adapted flare tube to an agent that the A.O.C. MED., Air Vice-Marshal Hugh Pughe Lloyd, knew to be operating on Sicily, the drop zone being on Mount Etna.
Back on Malta in his customary nightfighter role there was plenty of other excitement. On the chilly night of 9 November his engine failed after take off and he was forced to bale out at 500 feet. On landing he was all but set upon by Maltese rustics who assumed he was German. Fortunately ‘a splendid’ Gunner officer appeared in the nick of time and shooed away the lynch mob. Back in the Gunner's dug out a rare bottle of Scotch was produced and there followed a scene such ‘as only Englishmen can enact’. In due course Stones telephoned his dispersal only to be told to get off the line as one of their Flight Lieutenants had just been killed in a blazing Hurricane.
As the Germans stepped up the air assault on the Island, Stones was released from night fighting following the arrival of specialist Beaufighters, and he was re-assigned to day fighting with No. 605 Squadron at Hal Far. On 20 February he temporarily took command of the squadron, owing the removal of the C.O. following an incident in a Valetta nightclub and the intervention of the Provost Marshal. The air fighting now was as intense as anything Stones had known in the Battle of Britain, but here, ‘the odds were even greater.’ He further recalled, ‘Finding oneself attacking Ju. 88s over Grand Harbour in the middle of its lethally impressive anti-aircraft barrage, which cared not for friend or foe, was quite an experience.’
In the fierce fighting of March he added to his score a Ju. 88 damaged on the 1st; a Bf. 109 destroyed on the 6th, a Bf. 109 probably damaged on the 9th and a Ju. 88 shared damaged on the 18th. In April a Bar to his D.F.C. was gazetted and, long overdue for a rest, he was posted as an instructor to an O.T.U. at El Ballah, Egypt, but with the promise of the next available command of a squadron in the Western Desert.
The Arakan Front
In May, however, he was posted to India to command a new squadron, No.155, which was to be equipped with Mohawk fighters at St. Thomas's Mount aerodrome, Madras. When collecting personnel from a training base at Peshawar on the North West Frontier, he soon discovered that at 21 years he was the youngest pilot in the squadron. Undaunted, he resolved to have the unit combat-ready in four months, but as training got underway in the backwater of Madras the antics of his more boisterous pilots attracted the attention of the local Deputy Assistant Provost Marshal - ‘a most obnoxious little Welshman’. After several encounters with this officer, matters came to a head at the squadron's farewell party at the Connemara Hotel. Stones relates:
‘We were joined unexpectedly by two pilots on their way to Ceylon ... They were wearing their holstered revolvers as they were still in transit. Someone unbeknown to us called the Military Police, probably feeling that two pilots wearing their regulation side-arms were too warlike for this peaceful neck of the woods. The D.A.P.M. arrived and asked me if the two pilots belonged to my Squadron. I told him they did not, but were leaving shortly for Ceylon so he could go away and leave us in peace. He argued and I asked him to come outside the hotel rather than argue in the crowded lounge ... he had brought with him a large posse of his Military Police, and I told him to dismiss them at once. I, on my part would send the two pilots on their way to Ceylon. He told me what he thought about the nuisance value of my Squadron in Madras. Regrettably, I gave him my opinion that he was too big for his boots and was unnecessarily provocative. My actual words were undoubtedly more picturesque and included an exhortation to go forth and multiply.’
By 28 October, No. 155 Squadron was deemed fully operational and had moved up to Agartala, 300 miles north-east of Calcutta. Orders were issued for a ground-attack on a Japanese occupied airfield 200 miles south of Imphal at Shwebo, where the latest intelligence suggested a Jap fighter squadron was to be found. Taking off from their new base on the 29th, Stones led a force of 13 Mohawks to a temporary strip at Imphal, where the aircraft were refuelled by Gurkhas before taking off again for Shwebo. Unfortunately, there were no enemy fighters on the aerodrome but a twin-engined transport was destroyed together with a number buildings, one of which Stones and his No.2 set ablaze. All in all a satisfactory first outing for No. 155. Indeed Stones was merrily planning future operations when his forthright suggestions to the Welsh D.A.P.M. outside the Connemara Hotel caught up with him, and he was summoned to face a Court Martial in Madras, on a charge of ‘conduct unbecoming to that of an officer and a gentleman.’
The Flight Lieutenant defending recommended that he should insist every pilot who had been present should give evidence on his behalf, doubting that Group H.Q. would allow a whole squadron be taken out of the line. Stones considered the ploy but rejected it, believing that it would be disastrous for the morale of unit whose ‘blood was up for operations and not for sitting around Madras watching their C.O. being humiliated by a jumped-up military policeman.’ Consequently the hearing had but one possible outcome. Stones wrote, ‘It took two days. It was all about the language I had used to an officer junior to myself in front of his men, and overheard by others in the dining room of the hotel. I must admit it sounded a bit ripe in cold blood, but they managed to get some of my actual words wrong as, being non-combatants they hadn't heard them before.’ Eight frustrating weeks after the original summons to Madras, the Court finally handed out a ‘severe reprimand.’ As a result, Stones lost the acting rank of Squadron Leader and the command of No. 155 Squadron. It was a bitter blow.
In January 1943, he was posted to No. 67 Squadron, flying Hurricane IICs at Alipore, as the commander of ‘B’ Flight. Leading his flight in ‘stream-landing’ practice one morning his rudder and an elevator were chewed up and badly damaged by the airscrew of the Hurricane immediately behind, necessitating a difficult emergency landing. On moving up to the front the squadron was employed intercepting raids by Japanese Army 99 bombers and their Army 01 fighter escort (Oscars) on the Chittagong area, but the Hurricanes seldom gained the advantage of height due to late warning.
On 4 April Stones was scrambled from Chittagong to intercept a raid on Dohazari airstrip and was credited with a half share in a K-21 damaged. A week later No. 67’s C.O. was killed by an Oscar during a raid and acting command of the squadron devolved on Stones. Utilizing the forward airstrips in frequently disputed jungle territory, Stones led bomber escort missions and occasional ground attack sorties, ever conscious of the imminent monsoon thunderstorms which had been known to pull the wings off a Dakota.
On 15 May he led eight Hurricanes on an unusually deep penetration into enemy territory to bomb a Japanese fighter base at Kangaung, 260 miles inside Burma. On this occasion the Japanese were taken completely by surprise. The first run was made in formation at 50 feet, and accounted for at least two Oscars destroyed on the ground and one as it took off. On the second run, the Hurricanes went for individual targets including a locomotive, motor transport and troops. Stones sighted an Oscar parked away from the rest and though a third run was ‘against the rules’, he turned, attacked and saw it collapse in pieces, but was wounded in return by ground fire. In spite of a hole in his cockpit big enough to wave a hand through, Stones managed to fly to the forward airstrip at Ramu and on to Chittagong where he had requested an ambulance to meet him.
The attack on Kangaung was Stones’s 270th and last operational sortie of the War, and one which brought his final wartime victory tally to a total of 7 and 5 shared destroyed, 3 unconfirmed destroyed, 4 and 1 shared probable, 4 and 2 shared damaged and 1 destroyed on the ground.
Test Pilot
In hospital he succumbed to a bout of dysentery, and on recovery in July was posted to Bombay as a test pilot. In September he was transferred to Drigh Road, Karachi, where he remained for a year testing a wide variety of aircraft destined for the Burma front. Rated as an ‘Exceptional’ test pilot, he arrived back in the U.K. in November 1944 and applied for an operational posting but was sent to test Mosquito night fighters at Colerne, near Bath. In January 1945 he attended a Buckingham Palace Investiture to receive the Bar to the D.F.C. awarded in Malta three years previously.
In April he was given the tempting offer of joining a Typhoon squadron in North West Europe, or the option of a secondment as test pilot to Vickers-Armstrong at Weybridge. As the Vickers job held the promise of post-war employment he accepted the test flying post, operating out of Brooklands and Wisley. Among other types he tested a Warwick heavy bomber, and on one occasion barrel-rolled a Wellington, for which he was grounded. There was much horseplay on the ground, too. One day in September 1945 he was watching a civilian colleague attempting to install a detonator in another officer’s car when it exploded, causing Stones the loss of his left eye. Unable to continue as a pilot, he was posted to the Air Ministry, ‘flying a mahogany bomber’, and soon chose to leave the R.A.F., quitting the service in August 1946.
Colonial Administrator
Stones next joined the Colonial Service as a District Officer and magistrate, serving in Kenya, Tanganyika and Malaya until the mid-fifties. During the Malayan Emergency, he unofficially took to the air again, piloting a light aircraft from Perak Flying Club on leaflet dropping missions over the jungle. He also took to dropping sacks of money to remote rubber estates, so that the plantation managers could make up wage packets and thus save on the cost of expensive armoured road escorts made necessary by the activities of the communist terrorists.
Following Malayan independence he returned briefly to the U.K. to farm in the West Country before going back to Africa and establishing an agency for British, European and American aviation companies. He personally demonstrated many of the aircraft himself and in spite of coup d’etats and other obstacles remained there until the mid-seventies, selling among other aircraft MB. 326 jet trainers to the Ghanaian and Zambian Air Forces.
During his active retirement he crewed for a yacht delivery business and published his autobiography, Dimsie in 1991.
Squadron Leader Stones died in 2002.
9 November 1941 [on his second scramble of the day]: ‘Scramble - engine cut out on take-off - baled out at 500 feet - landed near only bottle of whisky for 5 miles’; the entry flanked by an ink drawing of a man on the end of a parachute.
2 February 1942: ‘Intruder [over] Catania. Tried to drop message on Gerbini but too much flak. Came out at 50 feet, got flak from hilltop and heard gun firing. Got a staff car near Modica. Small red flash’; the entry flanked by an ink and crayon drawing of said staff car.
18 March 1942: ‘Ten of us up. 605 and 242 with four Spits. Kept running into 109s as we waited for bombers. Spits engaged and so lost us. Kept turning. Found 88s over Kalafrana. Chased and hit one after Spit had had a crack. Had a crack at a second 88. 109s annoying again. Rest of ammo. into 3rd 88. This time 109s would not leave me so turned inside them at sea level. P./O. Lester flew into drink and got away with it’; and, on flanking page, ‘Posted to Middle East for rest.’
The second Flying Log Book (official Air Forces of India type) covering the period April 1942 to September 1945, the outside cover with pasted-down newspaper cutting entitled “Despatch to Mention” (‘Overheard in a Bayswater pub. “The only war record he has is Vera Lynn’s White Cliffs of Dover ... “; again with vivid operational commentary, this time of engagements in Burma, and ending back in the U.K. with an entry on 11 September 1945, ‘Explosion Wisley airfield. Lost sight left eye’, but with additional civilian flying entries for the period 1947-53; and the third Flying Log Book of a similar civilian nature, with entries from 1953-69, although actually in an official R.A.F. Pilot’s Flying Log Book.
References:
Dimsie, Memoirs of a Pilot from Air to Ground – A Trilogy, Donald Stones, 1991; Scramble, A Narrative History of the Battle of Britain, Norman Gelb, 1986; The Battle of Britain, Richard Hough and Denis Richards, 1989; Malta: The Hurricane Years, 1940-41,Christopher Shores, Brian Cull and Nicola Malizia, 1987; Malta: The Spitfire Year, 1942, Christopher Shores, Brian Cull and Nicola Malizia, 1991.
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