Biggin Hill
A table with black and red “planes”, a radar screen, a blackboard, head phones, 3 chairs.
Image/video clip projected on the background.
It is 2pm on a Sunday.
3 women come to the front
Joan: It was the year 1940
Helen: September 1st
Elspeth: At the RAF Aerodrome in Biggin Hill
Helen: It was the 1st of September
Joan: 1940
All: The day we thought we would die.
Sound of siren. Elspeth is working the radar screen, Joan is sitting with headphones on, Helen is writing coordinates on blackboard.
Voice: Evacuate the premises. We are under attack. I repeat, we are under attack. Go to the shelters immediately.
Helen is about to leave in a hurry.
Helen: Come on! What are you waiting for? We have to get out of here!
Elpeth: 51 degrees, 16 minutes, 27seconds North, 0 degrees, 10 minutes, 37 seconds East
Joan: Base to 6-10 Squadron. Base to 6-10 Squadron. You have enemy incoming from East-South-East.
Helen: Corporal Henderson! We have to leave! The Germans are back!
Elspeth: We have 3 coming in from 16, 28 North, 10, 25 East. 5 from 16, 58 North, 12, 32 East, 4 from 16, 68 North, 10, 4 East. They are all over the place!
Voice: We are under attack. I repeat, we are under attack. Leave your posts and go to the shelters now!
Helen: Please!
Elspeth: I am not going anywhere. If we leave our posts there will be no one to help our boys in the air.
Joan: I'm staying too. I can't leave Michael and the other pilots to fight in the dark.
A bomb falls.
Helen throws herself to the ground
Joan: We could really use your help, Turner.
Helen looks towards the door, but is too afraid to leave.
Helen: All right. I'll stay. Starts writing on the black board 51, 16, 27 North …
The girls do their jobs in a stressed environment. Their voices goes silent and their movement turn to slow motion. Helen turns to the audience (normal pace).
Helen: The bombs have been raining down on us for the past few weeks now. But the past couple of days has been beyond all reason. This afternoon we are having the 6th attack in 3 days. I am afraid. I saw the Germans come closer and closer this morning. I could see them on the radar and I could see that they were heading straight for us. I was thinking: Oh no, not again. I was so afraid. It seems that every day there is a little less left of the base. Walls and roofs missing, big holes in the ground. I prayed that after the attack this morning the Germans would leave us alone just for a little while. But just as the other days, they return in the afternoon with more bombs, more screams, more death.
I didn't use to be this frightened. In the beginning it was fun and exiting. We would spend all day helping the pilots to shoot down Germans, and then when our men returned in the evening, we'd all go down to the pub in the village.
Back when the war started it was decided that we should be the Main Flight Command and the final defence of London. This made us the prime target for Hitler's Luftwaffe. On August 18th we felt the impact of this responsibility. They carpet bombed us here at Biggin Hill, throwing 500 bombs within 10 minutes. Most of the base was destroyed. Every last surviving one of us was ordered to go out and fill the holes and craters of the runway with whatever we could find, so that the pilots could land safely. We succeeded and managed to send out more fighters that very afternoon. But I am so afraid right now. We have already suffered so much. We have lost so many lives. How much more can we withstand?
Sounds of sporadic bombs.
Helen returns to her work and all actions go back to normal pace.
Elspeth: Enemy at 51, 20, 03 North, 0, 21, 40 East – moving West
Helen moves planes on table
Joan: Base to fife-niner, base to fife-niner. Enemy straight East. Go get him, Michael!
Elspeth: Enemy at 51, 20, 53 North, 0, 21, 44 East.
Helen: Target is moving North.
Joan: Base to fife-niner, base to fife-niner. Your target is moving North now. Do you see him?
(To the girls) Michael has got a Junker in reach!
Helen: He'd better hit him, before they throw more bombs at us.
Elpeth: He is headed straight for us now.
Joan: Fife-niner. Do you see the enemy? He is North-West of you now.
(out) Fife-niner is firing at enemy target. (all 3 waiting in suspense) We've got a hit! German bomber is going down.
Helen: (looking at map) It'll land in one of the fields North-East of town.
Joan: (to girls) No need to send for the German. It was a crash and burn.
Base to fife-niner. You have one very proud fiancée waiting for you when you get back here.
Elspeth: (with a smile) Sergeant Mortimer, the radio is not for romance. Save it for your honeymoon. We are actually trying to fight a war here, remember.
They continue working.
Action turns to slow-motion and Elspeth turns towards audience.
Elspeth: I can't help but to feel a profound sense of pride that I get to take part in all of this. It is strange to think of how I ended up in this situation. My mother was in the Women's Royal Air Force back in the Cold War. Just as now, there was a shortage of able-bodied men to fight in the front lines, so women had to take over the men's jobs at the home-front. I remember feeling very proud of my mother for being a driver at an airbase and I think she would be very proud to see me here.
As soon as the war ended women were back in the kitchens, but from 1918 to 1920 my mother got to serve her country.
I was so exited when they established the Women's Auxiliary Air Force last year, I enlisted as soon as I had the chance. I was stationed here at Biggin Hill and after 6 month I received the title of Corporal. But it hasn't all been fun and games. Two weeks ago, on the 18th, when the 500 bombs fell all around us... A building collapsed. We had to dig out the wounded... and the dead. I fear that it will take me a lifetime before their faces are erased from my mind's eye.
2 days ago, the ops room I was in was hit by a bomb. I remember noticing that one of the walls had gone. Fire everywhere. Me and the others escaped through a broken window. The smoke felt thick in my throat. I had managed to get safely out of the building when I heard a voice shout at me to move. I then realised that what I was leaning against was an unexploded bomb. It all feels like a bad dream right now. But I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. Here I make a difference. My actions save lives. We might be sitting ducks here, but I'd rather fight back than sit and hide in a shelter and let the Germans do their worst. This is my country, and I would proudly die for it.
Resumes work, all back to normal pace
Joan: 3-1 has just shot a German Junker to the ground.
Helen: Good! So far we are hitting more of them, than they are us.
Elspeth: Great! I would give a round at the pub, but as you know, it was bombed to dust yesterday.
Joan: Fife-niner is hit, fife-niner is hit. Michael! Oh God no. Michael!
Everything freezes
Joan: I was supposed to be working at Hendon Armoury, but I had heard that all the action would take place at Biggin Hill. So I came here against all orders, met Michael at the town pub, and he helped sneak me in at the base. I just started working there. Trying to avoid the Commanding Officer, so he wouldn't start asking questions. Me and Michael fell in love almost straight away.
On the 18th of August when it was raining bombs... Michael was in the air fighting off the Germans. I looked outside and saw that it would be extremely difficult if not impossibly to land anywhere. There where so many unexploded bombs everywhere. I grabbed as many red flags as I could and ran out onto the runway. The bombs were still falling. I placed red flags by all the unexploded bombs, so that the pilot could steer safely around them. It was like a minefield. But I kept running. An officer ordered me to stop, and I did. At least until he wasn't looking any more. The air was thick of dust and sulphur, but I kept running with my red flags. All I could think off was to get Michael home safely. A bomb fell near me and I was knocked unconscious, I don't know for how long. I woke up and without thinking I continued my task until there were no more flags left. When Michael landed that night, the first thing he did was to ask me to marry him. I said yes.
Now I hear his voice in the radio telling me that he is hit, that he has lost control of the aircraft, that he is plummeting to the ground. He is crying. He tells me that he loves me. He starts to scream. He cries for God. He cries for his mother. He screams. (…) Then silence.
A distant plane is heard crashing
Unfreeze.
Joan: Michael! Michael!
The sound of bombs are closer now.
Helen: No! Oh God no!
Elspeth: I am so sorry, Joan.
Joan cries
Helen: We can't stay here! We are going to get killed! Let's go to the shelters. Please! I can't stay here.
Elspeth: We need you here. The men need you.
Helen: No I can't. I can't take any more of this. I'm going to the shelter.
Joan: Helen, please. If you go more pilots will die.
Helen: But I am so scared!
A bombs explodes nearby. The room shakes. They all fall down.
Helen: The shelter... The shelter is gone. All those people. Sedgewick, Peters, Matterson...
Elspeth: Don't worry about them now. There is nothing you can do. There are already people running there to save the survivors. Right now, if you want to save lives, you get back here and help us guide the pilots.
Helen: You are right. You are right. Let's do this. We can't let those Nazis get away with this.
Joan: Base to fife-fower. Enemy is approaching South-East of you.
The women continue their jobs.
The sound of bombs grows louder and more intense. Then silence.
Elspeth: It was the 1st of September 1940
Helen: It was the day we thought we would die.
Joan: But somehow we didn't
The End
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