Great Uncle Chick's Coastal Command Service in the RAF

My Great Uncle Chick (Ernest Dowen Hicken) served with Coastal Command in the RAF during the Second World War as a Wireless Operator and Air Gunner. He first flew in Handley Page Hampdens with 489 Squadron (RNZAF) in Scotland before transferring to 228 Squadron on Shorts Sunderland flying boats patrolling the Bay of Biscay on anti-submarine sorties. It was also whilst with 228 Squadron that he began to use radar as his flying log book states he was now an SE Op or Special Equipment Operator.

In 1945, he was transferred to 179 Squadron flying in Vickers Warwick aircraft, still on anti-submarine patrols as a Wireless Operator/Air Gunner, but also in air/sea rescue sorties around the south-eastern coast of Britain.

One story he used to tell was how his crew in 179 Squadron sank a German U-boat, but this was after Germany was defeated and the submarine was a captured one with no crew aboard which they were using as target practice!