Flying ace battled on for justice
DURING the Second World War Warrant Officer Harry Irons, DFC, completed 60 operational sorties over Europe for RAF Bomber Command, including the bombing of Dresden in 1945. He had joined the RAF in 1940 at the age of 16 as a rear gunner; the most dangerous task of all as the German night-fighters always tried to take out the rear gunner first.
He lied about his age in order to join the war effort, using his older brother’s papers.
One of his friends said Irons was so young when he started out that if he had been taken prisoner the Germans would have claimed that Britain was sending schoolboys to bomb them.
“Not many chaps survived more than four or five trips, so I consider myself very lucky,” Irons once said. “Losses were horrendous.”
Irons’ flying career began with No 9 Squadron flying Lancasters and he also flew Halifaxes with 158 Squadron, as either rear gunner or mid-upper gunner.
He was part of missions to Munich and Nuremberg and in October 1942 took part in a surprise attack; a daylight, low-level raid on Milan, when 90 Lancasters flew over the Alps to bomb the Italians.
He said every bombing raid was like “flying into hell” as hundreds of anti-aircraft guns with searchlights illuminated the sky all around them. “The fact I was never shot down was sheer luck,” said Irons, who was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross in 1945. “I knew plenty of others who were not so lucky.”
After taking on the Nazis, the veterans had another fight on their hands when they returned and discovered that they were not to be treated as heroes by the government due to political embarrassment about mass-bombing raids such as Dresden and Hamburg.
In 2007, Harry started a campaign for a permanent memorial to Bomber Command in London’s Green Park but as a trustee he faced losing his home when the construction bills rose steeply.
Thankfully, this situation was resolved, in part due to the generosity of Daily Express readers who helped to raise more than £1million for the memorial, unveiled by the Queen in June, 2012.
After the war, Irons became a tailor and later ran a successful dry cleaning business in Romford and Brentwood, Essex.
He was an ardent fundraiser for the RAF Benevolent Fund, enjoyed giving local talks about his flying career and in 2011 was an adviser on Trevor Nunn’s West End revival of Terence Rattigan’s 1942 play, Flare Path, starring Sheridan Smith and Sienna Miller.
Author and former RAF navigator Flight Lieutenant John Nichol said that Irons was “a real gent with a roguish attitude to life”.
Paying tribute to his incredible contribution, Air Vice-Marshal David Murray, chief executive of the RAF Benevolent Fund, said: “Harry was an inspirational man. Having fought and survived 60 operations as a rear gunner in the Second World War, he continued to fight public opinion and was vocal in his condemnation of the way veterans were treated, following the war.
“It is thanks to his and his comrades’ determination and tenacity that the Bomber Command Memorial was built in London’s Green Park.”
He was predeceased by his wife, with whom he had three children, five grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.