Lt Commander CH Filmer

The First Ten Months

The raid involved three South Africans. Lt Robert Southey Bostock lost his life, Lt Cecil Howard Filmer was shot down and became a “POW” while Lt Guy Warwick Brokensha was one of seven pilots who managed to fly their battered Skuas back to HMS “Ark Royal”. Thirty-year-old Bostock and twenty-four-year-old Filmer were educated at King Edwards in Johannesburg while twenty-two-year-old Brokensha finished his schooling at DHS in Durban.

The First Ten Months

Bostock ’s service details have not been sourced but he and Filmer were “Mentioned in Dispatches” on May 9th with Bostock receiving a second mention on June 25th. Filmer, a “South African Training Ship General Botha” graduate served as a battleship sub-lieutenant before becoming a Fleet Air Arm pilot in 1938 and was involved in the “Königsberg”, the first air attack sinking of the Second World War.

Not at Home for Christmas

Cecil Howard Filmer and Melville Neil McFadyen Kennedy had been “POW’s” for over two years. Filmer, a Fleet Air Arm pilot, attended King Edwards School in Johannesburg before becoming General Botha Cadet No 553 and was shot down in June 1940 attacking the German battlecruiser “Scharnhorst” in Norway. SACS educated, Squadron Leader Kennedy and his No 114 Squadron Blenheim crew were shot down in July.

Not at Home for Christmas

The escape and its aftermath were not forgotten, but by October the overwhelming number of new “POW’s” had watered down the negative effects on the camp while the enthusiasm of the Hut No 106 menu signatories “celebrating” their first and only Christmas behind barbed wire would not have been shared by veterans like Heaton- Nicholls, Filmer, SW Webster, Kennedy, and GM Wright 7.

Not at Home for Christmas

Cecil Howard Filmer, gave true meaning to being a survivor. Lt Commander Filmer flew with the Royal Navy until 1958, returned to the merchant navy at the age of 43, sailed the “Southern Seas” for 16 years and gained a reputation as being a “Sailor of the old Breed” who stood “among the world greats in seamanship and navigation” after moving his powerless freighter several hundred km using sails to escape the treacherous South Sea waters. Filmer retired to Durban and died in 2007 just short of his 92nd birthday and 75 years after the “General Botha”, having lived an extraordinarily full life.

Not at Home for Christmas

Lt Colonel Jack Robbs DFC attended King Edward’s School several years after Filmer, remained in the SAAF, and retired as a Major General in the 1970’s. A few of his SAAF contemporaries were “POW’s”, but he was unwilling to share his Stalag III and wartime experiences, “We often used to talk to him about the war, but he would not talk about it. It was like trying squeeze blood from a stone. All his Air Force buddies did likewise”.

The Airmen who started at Sea

Those present at the 1922 christening ceremony would not have anticipated that an illustrious group of Second World War airmen would emerge from the training facility’s tough two-year course. A few of those airmen, including CH Filmer, JS Simson, JW Sleigh, EJ Morris, and JD Nettleton are in this 1931 photograph with Nettleton also pictured as a young cadet.

The Airmen who started at Sea

Cecil Howard Filmer was shot down attacking the battlecruiser “Scharnhorst” and spent almost 5 years as a “POW” unaware of the later havoc caused by the battlecruisers “Gneisenau” and “Scharnhorst”, accounting for many merchant ships, an aircraft carrier and her supporting destroyers. Filmer attended King Edwards School before becoming Cadet No 553. A Royal Navy Sub-Lieutenant, he volunteered for the Fleet Air Arm in 1936, survived being shot in April 1940 attacking the German cruiser “Konigsberg”, the first major warship sunk by an air attack and was evacuated to Tromso on the “Glasgow” with the Norwegian King and the country’s gold reserves.