On another occasion Matthew related:

We went out, we were told to support the American and British forces. The armies . They were being held up. We were to go in at 4,000 feet most of our bombing heights were between 15,000 and 25,000 feet but this was a very low level bombing because we had to be precise with our bombing, so that we wouldn’t bomb our own troops.

The Germans were dug in at this village – at our briefing we were told there might be cloud over the target area but it was uncertain if there would be cloud or not, the Met. people couldn’t forecast how quickly the cloud was moving in.

The master bomber who gave all the directions over the target and the deputy master bomber started arguing over the target. The deputy master bomber put down the sky markers so that we would bomb on the sky markers. These were just flares. We bombed on the flares, but the master bomber who was late on arriving started cursing at the deputy master bomber for putting down these flares because the cloud was coming in quicker than expected. He called up to the crews to orbit and to circle so we were all going round in circles.

Now when we got out there all our own searchlights were crisscrossing forming a wall of light so the Germans couldn’t see what was happening but once we came over and all these planes were flying around the army got a bit jittery and they started firing at us and we fired off identity colours which were at that time of night a double red – double red fireworks – and it so happened that it was also the German colours for the same period – double red, only they started dropping their double reds on our aircraft and above our aircraft so that their fighters could come in underneath us and get us.

Now we were ‘coned’ in searchlights. Which is the worst thing that can happen, apart from being shot down. When you’re ‘coned’, you get caught in two searchlights and where they crisscross the centre is a field of light, and there’s nothing you could do in it. If it were German spotlights we would have taken evasive action. We would have picked one of the search lights and dived down at it to knock it out but because it was our own searchlights we flew straight and level and of course that gave the German Night fighters easy targets.

I think it was a Messerschmitt four one, it came in underneath the cone, in the darkness, and when the searchlights were taken off us, he opened fire on us. He was only about three metres away but fortunately his guns were out on the wings and he was so close to us his ammunition wasn’t coming near my turret. If he were 400 yards back he would have been in line for the turret, but he was too keen, too anxious and he just opened fire, so the shells went through the tail plane and underneath my feet and it actually shot away everything – our aerials, power lines, brake power, hydraulics, everything. The first thing I did when I realised that we were attacked was called the Skipper to dive and he dived, 2,000 feet and at 2,000 feet he managed to pull the plane level and he said, “Right I can’t control this – if you want to bale out, bale out!” No, first of all he gave a direct order for us to bale out. Now I was the first to bale out, or I should have been the first to bale out, I opened the turret and looked down and in the searchlights saw a trailing aerial for the radio underneath the plane, which was a wire, you know the wire which whips round your television aerial to your chimney head, the same wire as that. Now if I had jumped and got caught in that I would have lost an arm, or I could have lost a leg it’s so strong that wire, you know it would just tear it off. Anyway I straightened up the turret and plugged in my intercom again and told the skipper I couldn’t jump because of the trailing aerial.

So he says, “All right Sandy”, that was the wireless operator, “release the trailing aerial.”
Sandy did that but by that time skipper said, “Well, it’s up to you jump if you want or stay I think I can hold it now.”
We all decided to stay. Of course the pilot had the bomb aimer helping him so he managed to get the plane straight and level again but the trouble was we kept drifting south instead of coming direct home and we found ourselves over Paris and we shouldn’t have been within 100 miles of Paris. We called up at Paris to the airfield there and got no answer so we crossed the straits of Dover. There was an emergency airfield in Kent. We called up – no answer there. No joy, the place was in darkness. So we crossed the mouth of the Thames which was a dangerous area at that time, because the V1’s were flying across and you didn’t know where they were coming from or going to. They weren’t like fighter aeroplanes. We got up to Woodbridge, which was an emergency landing field. These emergency landing fields had runways 3 miles long. We called up, no we couldn’t get any reply – and it was only then we realised our overhead aerial had been shot away and with the overhead aerial shot away and the trailing aerial away, we didn’t have any aerials to get a signal out to the ground radio so eventually the wireless operator took the Aldis lamp and flashed signals to the ground and they came back on with an Aldis lamp and gave us permission to land.

Now, with the brake power being shot away, we just came rolling in along the runway. Fortunately our air speed indicator was working and we were able to land at normal speed but with no brakes. The landing speed was 90m.p.h., but with no brakes we were running along the runway with nothing to stop us. Of course the plane did slow down a bit, we were just coming to the very end of the runway and the Skipper thought if it went on any further we were just going to shoot off the runway into fields. So he pulled the aircraft right round and we rolled into a Nissan hut. The nose of the aircraft came up against the Nissan hut. I’ve never seen so many people scramble so fast in my life! Not only did Matthew have to endure the dangers of flying but also the discomfort of temperatures so cold that his sandwiches were frozen solid but eventually he safely completed the maximum 32 flights required by air crews during his years of service.

Matthew’s discharge certificate

After the war Matthew found himself in Ullapool and spotted a new young teacher at the school. She was also noticed by one of his friends but Matthew true to style wasn’t to be beaten and soon young Betty was to become Mrs Murray. From there they moved to various parts of the country before settling in Portmahomock where Matthew was very much part of the community until his death on the 8th November 2003. Matthew shared his adventures with many of Inver’s school children over the years and it is our privilege to record these memories for future generations.

Matthew with his wife