When I was a nipper my father used to sing the refrain from this song to me.
It used to go "No flak, no flak at all. plenty of searchlights but no flak at all.
It was sung to the tune of the Rugby song "No Balls at all."
Is anyone else familiar with it?
In the year anno domini one nine four one
Operations decide there was job to be done
Could have been Düsseldorf, Bremen or Ham?
But the laddies in 5 group did not give a damn
As they went into briefing the CO’s did call
‘there’ll be plenty of fighters but no flak at all’.
As 50 sqdn Hampdens went out to bomb Kiel
The aircrew as usual had not had its meal
and as they crossed Texel the gunner did cry
There’s a Messerschmitt fighter .. port quarter and high
They looked o’er the side .. it was easy to see
The pride of old Goering?.. the 109e
There was no sign of panic, no sign of fear,
But they took violent action in defence of the rear
From a night fighters cannon the tracers did shoot
The gunner cried out it had missed by a foot
He blazed off his Vickers, called Jerry rude names
And cheered when the Messerschmitt went down in flames.
And over the target down there below
The city was lit by a dull reddish glow.
The observer to the pilot did shout,
Open the bomb doors, let the beggars look out
He pressed the old tit and the s**** whistled down
Hurrah cried the gunner, they’re smacking the town
But the natives of Kiel took a rather dim view
And showed there are flak guns there was more than a few.
They blazed out their armament, heavy and light,
till the heavens resembled Brock’s benefit night.
Each AA’s opened up over the drink
And the crew to the observer created a stink
O get us a fix to the wops they did yell
If you don’t hurry up we will end up in hell
Fix was obtained to dm three?
As they went in to pancake they chortled with glee
Shot horrible lines to intelligence blokes
Who give air crew cheer up coffee and smokes
Here’s a moral for pilots, for gunners and wops
If you want to stay healthy don’t do any ops
And if in the next war they want you to fight
Keep your feet on the deck and sleep tight every night
