British airmen killed on foreign soil [SUBTITLES] скачать в хорошем качестве

British airmen killed on foreign soil [SUBTITLES]

On the evening of February 22, 1945, nine-year-old Jens Tore Johnsen sat at home in Langang, Tvedestrand, waiting for his mother and sisters. They were on their way home from an event at the community school in Kvastad. It was a Thursday. Jens Tore's father was not home; he lived all week in Eydehavn, where he worked at the Arendal Smelting Plant. At the same time that Jens Tore was home alone, a converted Short Stirling bomber was en route from southern England with weapons and other equipment for the Norwegian Resistance. A Milorg group in Hakadal was ready to light flares when they heard the sound of the plane. The plane was flown by a 28-year-old pilot. His crew consisted of five young men, or rather boys, aged 21-23. Jens Tore's mother and sisters came home to Langang around 10:30 p.m. Jens Tore asked them to tell him how the meeting at the school had gone. The large transport plane with several tons of equipment was approaching the Norwegian coast quickly. When it came over the coastline, it was detected on the Germans' radar. There was no hiding in the darkness of the night. German fighter planes, also equipped with radar, took off from Kjevik airport near Kristiansand. It was late for nine-year-old Jens Tore that evening. But after his sisters had told him about the meeting at the school, he had to go to bed. Before he got into bed, he and his family heard a terrible crash, a very powerful explosion that must have come from a place very near the family's home. The sound of the explosion was heard by people in a large area, and it quickly became clear that a tragedy had unfolded. The large, heavy, and almost unarmed Stirling was an easy target for the skilled and experienced German fighter pilots. The British transport plane was already engulfed in flames and hopelessly lost when it crashed into the small mountain top of Lusa in the middle of a field. There was a crater in the ground at the foot of Lusa. Those who arrived at the crash site were met with a terrible sight. Both the plane and crew were blown into small pieces. What they were able to find of the young pilots was placed in one casket. There had never been so many people at a funeral at Holt Church as there were when the British airmen were laid to rest. This was the only public funeral allowed by the German occupiers. British airmen who were killed were respectfully treated but were later buried in absolute silence. Throughout the winter and spring of 1945, many British transport planes were shot down over southern Norway, in other places such as Vegårshei, Hegland in Tvedestrand, and near Arendal. Despite the fact that the Germans confiscated all radio equipment early in the war, and later stole it, radio played an important role in the communication between the Allies in London and the Resistance at home in Norway. Throughout southern Norway, Milorg groups sat and listened for their "special message," a message telling them that the Resistance fighters had to be ready to receive dozens of containers, weighing a couple of hundred kilograms each, containing weapons, explosives, radios, shoes, clothes, tobacco, biscuits, chocolate, and much more. The special messages could be meaningless phrases, such as "Grandmother has gotten a pistol," "The mouse is dancing on the table," and "The horse is dancing a waltz." The Germans listened eagerly to the Norwegian broadcasts from the BBC in London. They naturally knew what the secret messages entailed, but had no idea where the drops were to take place or where the transport planes would come in over Norway. It was a game of cat and mouse. Jens Tore Johnsen, who was nine years old in February 1945, still remembers what happened after the plane crash. After a few days, the children were allowed to approach Lusa and see the place where the Stirling had exploded. "We're standing in a cemetery," Jens Tore says today. "Remnants of the plane are still buried deep in the ground. The same goes for body parts of the flight crew." In this film, Jens Tore Johnsen (born 1936) tells the story of the dramatic days at the very end of World War II. He believes that the memory of the fallen airmen must be kept alive. That's why he takes care of the memorial that was erected in the 1980s near the place where the six British flyers sacrificed their lives, and a little away from Holt Church where they were later buried in foreign soil.