He was born on 7th May 1917 at Kalisz, Poznan, Poland and went through
all the normal stages of school and National Service but he was born in
difficult times and on 18th December 1938 he was recalled to military service
as everyone in Poland knew that war was coming.
He was posted to 3 Pulk Lotniczy in Posnan where he was inducted into
the Polish Army aviation branch (there was no separate Air Force at this stage)
as an electrician and fitter.
He was involved in all the hurried preparations for what everyone feared
would happen and he was directly involved in the fighting from the German
Invasion on 1st September until his capture on the 17th of that month. It is not clear how he was captured by the
Russians as the fighting around Posnan and Lodz was with the Germans. It must be assumed that he was with a
retreating group when the Russians attacked from behind.
In any event, he was sent to a Prisoner of War camp at Tockoje in Russia
where he was interned until Hitler launched
Operation Barbarossa and treacherously attacked his former allies. The Russians were forced to release the
Polish prisoners under an "amnesty" on condition that they either
joined the British or Russian forces to fight the Germans. The Poles did not like the idea of an amnesty
since it implied that they had done something wrong. However they accepted it because it was their
ticket to freedom and the only way they were going to escape from the Soviet Union.
He was released as part of the first batch of 30,000 Poles in the week
from 24th-31st March 1942 and was marched the five kilometres to the Tockoje
railway station which sat astride the main line from Buzuluk to Czkalow (now
Orenburg) which was very close to the Kazakhstan border. At this stage his commanding officer was General
Michal Karaszewicz-Tokarzewski who had been the Senior Polish Officer in the
camp and was, by this time, second in command to General Anders and the senior
recruiter for the newly forming Anders' Army.
The men moved on en masse towards Krasnovodsk in Kazakhstan with the
sole intention of getting out of the Soviet Union and into British held
territory in the Middle East. From this
port they boarded any and every vessel they could to cross the Caspian Sea to Persia
(now Iran) to the port of Pahlevi where they were given the chance of a hot
bath, good food and decent clothing (British uniform). They were separated into two tented
encampments on the beach where natural winds circulated and there was at least
some chance of controlling the spread of disease. Most of them, even those not already infected
by diseases, were suffering malnutrition brought on by hard work and a totally
inadequate diet.
Although a lot of civilians had travelled with the new members of
Anders' Army, most of the men were destined to serve in the North African
campaign in Libya and Egypt or in the Italian campaign at Monte Cassino where
it was finally the Poles who took the hill and won the battle. However a number were selected to go directly
to Great Britain where there was a desperate need for trained air crew and
ground crew with aviation skills. Ewald
fell amongst this group and was one of the first of those released by the
Russians to reach Britain. It was to be his
destiny to maintain the aircraft of the Polish squadrons in Britain.
His route is unknown but it was one of many tortuous routes to avoid the
U-Boats and the concentrations of Luftwaffe fighters. He actually arrived at the Polish Depot - a
group of RAF sites in the Blackpool area - on 8th July 1942. Within a week he had been attached to 302
Polish fighter squadron but this was really only a paper transaction and he was
physically posted to No 14 School of Technical Training at RAF Henlow,
Bedfordshire on 6th August 1942 where he remained until 11th March 1943 when he
was posted to 304 Squadron servicing Wellington Bombers initially at RAF Dale,
Pembrokeshire, Wales moving to RAF Docking, Norfolk on 30th March 1943 and RAF Davidstow Moor, Cornwall on 10th June
1943.
Ewald is 3rd from left with 304 Squadron
Ewald, left, sitting on the tail of a bomb
On 27th October 1943 he was transferred to 302 Fighter Squadron (part of
84 Group, 131 Wing of the 2nd Tactical Air Force (2TAF) at RAF Chailey near
Burgess Hill, Sussex which was created as a support airfield for the impending
invasion of Continental Europe. On 1st
August 1944 he embarked for the Continent where he would spend most of the rest
of the War maintaining the fighters of
302 Squadron.
Two pictures of Ewald's Continental "office"
This one is not for repair!
After his return to England he joined the Polish Resettlement Corps on 11th March 1947. This was effectively his termination of
service even though he was now technically employed by the Royal Air Force for
a period of up to two years. This
arrangement meant that he would have a source of income and a place to live
until he had assimilated into civilian society.
However, he soon found a job as a spinner and later as a cloth examiner
with Coppull Ring Mill in Coppull near Chorley in Lancashire.
Publication of his British Naturalisation
Thereafter he became a Registered Alien and this meant he could only
move his location or change his job with the permission of the Ministry of
Labour. This lasted until he became a
British Citizen on 21st May 1951 a fact that was recorded in the London Gazette
of 20th July 1951. He did eventually
change his job and spent the rest of his working life in electrical trades. He married Marion Baxendale and had a son and a daughter and
lived happily until his death on 7th August 1994.
Ewald's Polish RAF record
As an end note, a charming little story told to me by his daughter: when
Ewald was leaving to join the Polish Air Force he went into a little shop near
where he lived and asked could he have some cigarettes and could he pay on his
first leave, the lady in the shop let him have them but he never went back as
he was deported to Siberia. He did not return until 1969 with his wife and
children on a holiday to visit his family.
The shop was still there and when he went in to pay for the cigarettes
the same lady was behind the counter, she wanted to let him off but he insisted
he was paying for them!
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