Winkle –?Who?

'His nickname was Winkle??Winkle Brown?' queried my friend, 'He's?not?famous! No one knows who that is!'

He was right.?Who?has heard of Captain Eric Melrose Brown of the Royal Navy?

Well, if you are interested in any aspect of aviation, Winkle Brown will be (or should be) sitting at the top of the table of your most world-famous pilot pioneers. A pilot who accomplished a life of unbelievable flying and professional life experiences, which I am always surprised has not been snapped up by a director and made into a Boy’s Own adventure film.

Back in 2006, I first met Winkle when I was an active member of the Guild of Aviation Artists. I was amazed and pleased to find I had been awarded several prizes for my first-ever aircraft painting on show at the Guild's Annual Awards ceremony, held in the prestigious Mall Galleries, off Pall Mall in London.

The contents of my 'Jaguar on Heat' emerged from one of my most unforgettable and exciting painting background research visits. Thinking back to how my painting came about and how my life signposts crossed over into shaking the hand of Winkle, I will tell that story first before bringing us back to the day I met Captain Eric Melrose Brown.

To say I was 'blown away by the moment' is an understatement. In 1990, at what was Royal Air Force Abingdon in England, former Formula 1 driver Martin Brundle raced a TWR (Tom Walkinshaw Racing) Le Mans-winning Jaguar XJR-12

from a standing start against an RAF SEPECAT Jaguar GR.1 jet fighter over a one-mile, straight-line course next to the runway.

Having seen this event in the news, I wanted to try and capture the unique racing moment in a dramatic painting.

The fighter was piloted by Squadron Leader Mike Lawrence, who lost ground to the Jaguar racing car at the start of the race - the fighter's enormous thrust from the twin Rolls-Royce Turbomeca Adour turbofan engine reheat caused the aircraft to go up as well as forward, and, unbelievably, Mike lost acceleration pace to the XJR-12.

On arrival at the base, I was invited by an RAF Liaison Officer to have lunch in the Mess with Mike. We chatted over a lovely pie, chips and baked beans about my project and his unsuccessful but unique race with the Jaguar. Polishing off his meal, he announced his next port of call was RAF Coltishall, where he had to fly a Jaguar back for maintenance, a distance of 190 miles by car. Without much traffic, the journey would take me 3 hours and 30 minutes by car. I asked Mike how long it would take him, 'Oooh, 10 to 15 minutes...'.

To my astonishment, he invited me to see his aircraft start up at its hanger. After leaving the mess, the Liaison Officer took me to a hardened bunker where the fighter was being prepped. Mike appeared, gave me a wave, climbed up the steps into his cockpit, closed the canopy and began the routine to start the Rolls-Royce Turbomeca engine – a glorious, howling sound, which gradually increased in volume… and then, to my puzzlement… it did the opposite, as Mike shut it down. The canopy opened, and Mike shouted to the technician that he needed a new part (a bulb) for the instruments.

That has made me chuckle, knowing the Jaguar was introduced into service in 1973, way before LEDs and when, in ’69, 64 Kbytes of computer memory were used to try and land the first men on the moon.

Duly fitted with the expensive part, the engine start was underway again, with the wonderful action and sound happening 50 feet away from me. I overheard the Liaison Officer talking with Mike using her walkie-talkie. She turned to me and said, 'Mike has invited you to the runway to see him take off for a photo shoot.'

I could not believe what I had just heard.

We proceeded, not to the usual considerable air show distance between the public fence and the runway, but to the actual edge of it – I was standing next to the tarmac with a Jaguar fighter about to take off. Unfortunately, it was a very misty day, and I couldn't see much, although I knew the Jaguar was there when Mike started his take-off run and came past me with reheat on – a mind-blowing sound.

Standing on the runway edge in shock, the Liaison Officer tapped me on the shoulder and said Mike was asking if I wanted him to come around again for another photo session – just for me. Mmm... I didn't have to think about that one. Mike passed 30 feet above the deck, wheels up and reheat on. I had my own air display!

My final painting of the event featured only Mike's Jaguar since the composition didn't quite gel, including the Le Mans-winning Jaguar car. I was pleased with the final image and was delighted to see that, for some reason, the runway tarmac lines in the foreground shimmered beautifully on the original painting.

At this point in the story, I think it is time to return to 2006 and the Guild of Aviation Annual Exhibition in the Mall Galleries and be awarded my prizes by celebrated pilot Winkle Brown.

It was a great moment for me to have chatted with and shaken the hand of someone who, being fluent in German, had interviewed Reich Marshal Hermann G?ring, Ernst Heinkel, Wernher von Braun, Kurt Tank and the famous Hanna Reitsch, whom he had met before WW2 with Ernst Udet. Reitsch was Nazi Germany's celebrated woman test pilot who had flown the VI rocket bomb in sub-orbital flight in the early 1940s and the ME 163 Komet.

Winkle told me that commanding the Enemy Aircraft Flight, he had piloted, tested and evaluated 53 German planes that had fallen Allied hands, including the Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet rocket fighter, the Messerschmitt Me 262A?Schwalbe, the Arado Ar 234B?Blitz?and the Focke Wolf 190.

He recounted his vast experience developing deck landings on aircraft carriers, totting up three firsts: in 1944, landing a twin-engine de Havilland Mosquito on HMS Indefatigable.

In 1945, Winkle was the first pilot to land a tricycle undercarriage Bell Airacobra, on HMS Pretoria Castle, and in 1945, he landed the first jet – a de Havilland Vampire – on HMS Ocean. Winkle was responsible for proving the worth of steam catapult-launched aircraft to the Americans and their adoption of the angled flight deck. Having landed at RAF Cranwell, he discussed improvements to his new jet engine for carrier-based aircraft with Frank Whittle.?

In 1944, Winkle advised Jimmy Doolittle – yes, that General Doolittle – the architect of the daring Mitchell raid on Tokyo after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, on which aircraft should continue to escort the USAFF 8th Airforce on their bombing missions across Germany. He and other pilots performed dive compressibility testing at the RAE (Royal Aircraft Establishment in England) on a P-38H Lightening, a P-47C Thunderbolt and a Merlin-powered P-51B Mustang.

The Mustang's excellent 0.78 Mach number helped Doolittle secure the North American design's place in history?as the sole fighter for USAAF bomber escort and air supremacy missions.

Winkle was born on 21st January 1919, a few months before Alcock and Brown entered the aviation history books by flying their converted Vickers Vimy WW1 bomber non-stop from St. John's, Newfoundland to Ireland. Winkle visited the 1936 Berlin Olympics with his father and met Hermann G?ring and Ernst Udet. Udet introduced the seventeen-year-old to flying via his Bücker 131 Jungmann – in a series of crazy but memorable aerobatics that set Winkle firmly on the road to a career in aviation.

He became the most decorated Royal Navy, Fleet Air Arm officer and test pilot – CBE, DSC, AFC, Hon FRAeS – who, unbelievably, had flown more aircraft and their types than any other pilot in history – 487 aeroplane designs and held the world record for aircraft carrier landings.?

Winkle turned out to be a wonderful character at the London art exhibition. When I stepped onto the small stage to receive my awards for my painting

'Jaguar on Heat', he greeted me with a lovely, gravelly Scottish voice and a marvellous, dry sense of humour. He shook my hand, congratulated me on my prize success, and then pulled me towards him, asking, 'Are you?THE?famous Peter Sissons – the one that used to be on the television and read the ITN news?' I laughed because, back in the 90s, I always heard that question when I answered the phone. I told him my stock reply: 'No, but I am?THE?Peter Sissons; the other just read the news.' Winkle laughed his socks off at my response and continued to entertain his exhibition audience with his jaw-dropping aviation exploits.

He was a true gentleman who passed away in his sleep in February 2016.

Try and get a copy of his autobiography - 'Wings on My Sleeve' - and be amazed at what Winkle did with his life.

Peter Sissons

www.petersissonswriterauthor.com

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