Lawrence ’Nick’ Nicholson was the rear gunner on the Lawson crew, flying in TL-J of 35 Squadron, part of the third wave in the attack on Cologne of 23 December 1944. Almost one third of the attacking aircraft, all Pathfinders, were lost on this dramatic and dangerous raid.

The following are Nick Nicholson’s recollections of that night, which have never been published before. ‘Kiwi’ was the nickname for Lou Lawson, his pilot, who self-evidently came from New Zealand.

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By now the winter had really set in and the weather was cold, cloudy and foggy. On the afternoon of 20th December we went to be briefed for a raid scheduled for that night on the Gremburg marshalling yards at Cologne but it was later called off, due to bad weather. It was cancelled again the following night and so with time to myself my thoughts turned to Christmas and to my family back in Hull. Little did I know then that I would be very lucky to see Christmas Day.

On the 23rd it was obviously decided that due to the importance of the target the raid would have to be mounted as a daylight sortie comprising of 30, all Pathfinder, aircraft. We were to go in three waves of 10, each led by an OBOE Lancaster backed up by an OBOE Mosquito. Due to the shocking weather, I really thought the raid would be impossible. Graveley was covered with fog and I couldn’t see how we could possibly take off in such conditions. But although we were the last aircraft airborne, take off we did, using FIDO, an experimental fog dispersal device. 


Tragically, the raid got off to a bad start when two of our squadron’s Lancs collided over the Thames estuary. Although we learnt later that the crews were picked up within half an hour, it would have been impossible for them to have survived long in the freezing cold water.

But our troubles had only just begun. The weather forecasters had promised 10/10ths, or total cloud cover, all the way to and over the target area in Cologne, and so I was not anticipating any further problems. However, just before we started our bomb run the cloud suddenly vanished completely and the sky above Cologne was clear blue for miles. Sitting in the rear turret I couldn’t see the thick wall of flack that we were fast approaching but suddenly it seemed as if every gun in Germany had opened up on us and it was then that we received the prearranged codeword, “Cowboy”, which meant that we were to break formation and bomb independently. 


Just as we commenced the bomb run our bomb aimer, Alan Card, was hit in the face by flak and became temporarily blind and deaf . At the same time our wireless operator, Ted Herod, volunteered to put his head into the astrodome to look out for fighters and almost immediately fell to the floor, his head covered in blood as the astrodome was hit by flak.

‘Kiwi’ had to circle around the target again before Alan was in any fit state to continue the bomb run and I remember saying, “I reckon we’ve had it!” 
The sky was literally full of flak – and I mean full – and I could see enemy fighters circling around the perimeter of the flak zone waiting to pick us off, if by some miracle we managed to get through to the target. By now Alan had recovered sufficiently and he made a perfect bomb drop (his film later showed we had hit the target), and so all we had to do now was turn around and go home.

Then the Flight Engineer, Fred ‘Eddy’ Edmondson, was hit on top of the head but fortunately for him the shrapnel hit his flying helmet which deflected the impact and luckily he was not seriously injured. At the same time I had a lucky escape when flak burst just to the side of my turret and a piece of shrapnel shot through and impacted behind my head just above my left shoulder – 6″ to the right and I would have been a gonna.

Our Lancaster was by now very badly shot up and limping along on three engines, so I wasn’t surprised when I heard ‘Kiwi’ talking to an Allied airfield in Belgium asking for permission to make an emergency landing. I was far too busy looking for fighters to think of anything else but the next thing I recall was ‘Kiwi’ saying that he going to try to make it across the Channel and contacting the emergency landing base at Manston, Kent, to tell them we were coming in.

As we approached the Kent coast our predicament worsened as five German ME109’s were seen closing in to finish us off. Miraculously, a flight of United States Air Force Mustangs was scrambled and escorted us into Manston without any problems. Despite having no brake pressure, and only three good engines, ‘Kiwi’ managed to land the crippled Lancaster safely, bringing it to a halt just off the end of the long runway, fortunately the longest in England!


When I got out, Eddy and I started to count the holes . . . we lost count after 100 and that was just on one side between the wing and my rear turret. Sadly that was the end of ‘J’ for ‘Johnny’ which was written off after faithfully seeing us home on 33 missions in just exactly 5 months to the day. (I later learnt that it was repaired and returned to service in February 1945.)


Alan and Ted went off to hospital and both were awarded immediate DFC’s. 


The next day Kiwi went off to identify the bodies of the two crews from our squadron who had collided on the way out, whilst Eddy and I made our way back to Graveley.

Images courtesy of Peter Nicholson.