page_title: Murray Peden
section_title: Operational tour: September 1943 - September 1944
hierarchical_section_title: Murray Peden / World War II / Operational tour: September 1943 - September 1944
caption_attribution_description: English: Stirling Mark I, BF382 'BU-Q', of No. 214 Squadron RAF on the ground at RAF Stradishall, Suffolk, at the end of its operational service.
context_page_description: Flight Lieutenant David Murray Peden, QC, DFC, is a Canadian retired air force pilot, lawyer, and author. From 1941 to 1945 Peden served in the Royal Canadian Air Force as a bomber pilot, completing the majority of his tour of duty with No. 214 Squadron RAF, part of RAF Bomber Command. Following the War he returned to Canada and became a lawyer in Winnipeg. Peden has authored three books. He is best known for his 1979 memoir A Thousand Shall Fall, which former director of the Canadian Army Historical Section, C. P. Stacey, called "the best book any Canadian has written about his war experiences, and one of the best books about the war that has been written anywhere."
context_section_description: Peden and his crew arrived at RAF Chedburgh late in the afternoon of 22 September, ready to begin the operational tour. At the time of his arrival, 214 was flying Short Stirlings. The night of his arrival Peden was assigned to fly as a co-pilot in a bombing raid on Hanover. Peden described his thoughts upon hearing of the target, saying, "I felt a tremour. Hanover struck me as a pretty deep penetration for my maiden effort into the fatherland." Following the sortie he explained his feeling of relief, stating, "[w]e had been flying for five hours and 25 minutes, and I had never experienced a sensation of relief quite as intoxicatingly satisfying as what I felt as I climbed out the rear doors and stepped onto the lovely, wonderful, marvelous, fabulous, solid old concrete of that good old dispersal." The following night Peden flew again as a co-pilot, this time in a raid on Mannheim. On the night of 25/26 September, Peden flew his first operational sortie with his own crew. This sortie was a "gardening" operation in the Frisians. Again on 2/3 October Peden's crew flew a gardening sortie, this time around Anholt Island. On 3/4 October the crew flew their first major bombing operation with Kassel as the target. The night of 8/9 October saw the crew fly a raid on Bremen. After this sixth sortie, on 15 October Peden and his crew were granted leave. At this time he returned to Glasgow to visit family again.
  On the morning of 9 November 1943, Peden and crew were transferred to No. 161 Squadron at RAF Tempsford for temporary service. No. 161 Squadron, along with No. 138 Squadron, were highly secretive units working in conjunction with Special Air Service and Special Operations Executive to deliver material to the French Resistance. The day of his arrival at Tempsford, Peden was notified that he would be flying as co-pilot that night. Before the evening's sortie, King George and Queen Elizabeth visited the station to inspect the crews that would fly that night, and later joined them for afternoon tea in the officers' mess. The next night Peden again flew as a co-pilot. After a practice drop at Henlow on 12/13 November, Peden subsequently flew supply drops with his own crew on 15 and 18 November. They later flew in a mining raid on the Le Havre harbour on the night of 22/23 November, and then had an aborted sortie on 11 December.
  Peden and crew rejoined 214 Squadron, which had been posted to RAF Downham Market, on 13 December, and on the 18th was granted leave. On 4 January 1944 Peden flew a raid on the Bristillerie V-1 launching site in the Pas-de-Calais. This was his 13th operation, and the final one he would fly in a Stirling. After a short repose, on 17 January, 214 Squadron was transferred to RAF Sculthorpe where it would become part of the new No. 100 Group RAF, a radar countermeasures unit. The squadron would now fly the American Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, and would be trained on it by members of the United States Army Air Forces. Through February and March the airmen of 214 acclimatized themselves to the B-17, and from 4 to 12 April, Peden's crew flew exercises with the Bomber Development Unit at RAF Newmarket. On the night of 24/25 April, after nearly 15 weeks off operations, Peden flew a sortie on Karlsruhe. In this first sortie as part of 100 Group, the crew undertook its new supporting duty of disrupting VHF communication between German controllers and pilots. The crew flew again on 8/9 May, this time to Haine-Sainte-Pierre. On 16 May 214 Squadron transferred to RAF Oulton, where the officers took their living quarters near Blickling Hall. During their time at Oulton, the men of 214 Squadron met Margaret Lockwood and James Mason, who were filming The Wicked Lady at Blicking Hall. Peden flew next on 19/20 May on a sortie to Le Mans. On the night of 5 June, the night before the Invasion of Normandy, Peden's crew was selected to fly a patrol along the French coast in support of 15 Lancasters that would bomb coastal batteries. Unaware that this was the morning of the Invasion, Peden described what he saw on his return flig
caption: A 214 Squadron Short Stirling
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