Flt Lt Wallace McIntosh

Wallace McIntosh, airforce officer: born Tarves, Aberdeenshire 27 March 1920; DFM 1943; DFC 1944 and Bar; married 1957 Christine Cooper (died 1991; one son, two daughters); died Aberdeen 4 June 2007.

During the Second World War, Wallace McIntosh survived 55 missions over enemy territory and shot down eight enemy aircraft to become RAF Bomber Command's most successful air gunner. Flying with a Lancaster on D-Day plus one over France, he shot down three German fighters.

Wallace McIntosh was born in 1920 in a barn in Aberdeenshire. His unmarried mother, Lizzie, wanted to give him up to an orphanage, but her parents persuaded her to let them adopt him. His early years were spent in poverty, moving from farm to farm in Perthshire and Aberdeenshire with his grandparents and their seven children. After a scant education at Grantully school, he left at 13, by which time he had become skilled in killing food for his family's table. The odd sheep, salmon and pheasant were his greatest catches. He worked as a labourer or in any job that brought him money.

At the outbreak of war, he cycled 30 miles to Dundee to join the RAF, which rejected him because of his inadequate education. However a local priest took McIntosh under his wing and later persuaded the RAF to take him. He resented the harsh initial training but could see the sense in the discipline and enjoyed the camaraderie. He spent much of his time on guard duty and on one occasion, on hearing a Dornier bomber overhead, he turned a Lewis gun on it, causing it to drop its bombs far from its target, a radar station. His gunnery skills did not go unnoticed and he was accepted as an air gunner in March 1943 and joined 207 Squadron at Langar, near Nottingham.

In June 1943, McIntosh was given a commission. He never in his wildest dreams imagined this would happen. He went from seven shillings a day to 21 shillings, but felt decidedly uncomfortable sitting in a first class compartment on a train en route to his proud grandparents. At the end of his first tour he became an instructor.

In June 1944 he was involved in a raid over Mailly-le-Camp. His Lancaster was lucky to get off the ground as one of its engines caught fire as it was taking off. Only the immense skill of the pilot got the plane airborne as the crew fought to put out the flames. They continued on three engines to the target where they found hundreds of other aircraft circling because radio communications had broken down. They became sitting ducks for the fighters who shot down 42 bombers. In the attack McIntosh shot down a Me110.

He was to describe, many years later, in his moving autobiography, Gunning for the Enemy (2003), how he was "crushed into the mid-upper turret of a Lancaster, cocooned in constricting layers of flying gear, his ears violently assaulted by four great pounding Rolls-Royce Merlin engines". He was looking for most of the time into impenetrable darkness, waiting for fighters.

On 7 June 1944, 112 Lancasters including McIntosh's took off to attack the enemy in a wooded area of Normandy near Bayeux. As they were leaving their target they were attacked by two Ju88s. McIntosh told the pilot to corkscrew carefully, as this gave the gunners a clearer sight of the enemy. He and the other gunner Sutherland shot both down within a minute.

Then, just as they were over Beachy Head, an Me210 attacked, but again McIntosh and Sutherland shot him down. They had expended 8,000 rounds in these three combats. Both gunners were awarded an immediate DFC. The usually taciturn Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur "Bomber" Harris sent McIntosh a Postagram congratulating him. After another tour with 207 Squadron in which he shot down three more of the enemy, he was awarded a bar to his DFC.

McIntosh stayed on in the RAF for a short time but became restless with peacetime flying. He took a job as an agricultural representative, selling foodstuffs to farmers. He then moved to the seed merchants Barclay, Ross and Hutchinson, later becoming director of its ironmongery division.

He never forgot those who had been killed with Bomber Command and worked hard to raise money for two memorials to the thousand men killed in 207 Squadron.

Max Arthur