After not flying since he helped oversee the Japanese surrender in Singapore in 1945, Alan Barkes was back in the air for the second time in a few weeks last weekend to attend a special ceremony.
Despite the Leading Aircraftsman’s services in Burma during World War Two, the 97-year-old had never been invited to the annual Project Propeller memorial event for RAF veterans in Wolverhampton on Sunday.
That was until he developed his friendship with Nigel Fallow, whose father Tom fought alongside Alan in South East Asia, initially in India.
The pair got in touch after Alan contributed to a book on RAF parachute units and as previously reported in The Voice, keen pilot Nigel took Alan for his first flight in 73 years in May.
The pair were up in the air again on Sunday flying to this year’s Project Propeller in Wolverhampton.
“It was fantastic,” Alan said. “A really good day.
“We flew 3,000 feet over Birmingham and it was great there alongside Nigel with the headphones on.
“The event itself was wonderful.
“There were over 130 aircraft there and I met some wonderful people.”
Alan, who is Lincolnshire born and bred, went to war initially as part of the 2810 (Field) Squadron RAF Regiment.
He vividly remembers when Air Chief Marshal Keith Mountbatten visited the squadron asking for volunteers to join the new 2810 (Parachute) Squadron that was being formed.
Alan had never jumped out of a plane before but was quick to volunteer for the mission known as Operation Zipper.
Its aim was to go behind enemy lines and parachute into Malaysia to liberate it from the Japanese.
Training took place in Burma amid the conflict. On one occasion they were informed six Japanese soldiers were nearby and Alan was one of eight who went out to look. His group were ambushed.
“The jungle was so thick you had to cut away the bamboo, and that’s when we got ambushed,” Alan said. “They killed two of my colleagues.
“We responded and could see we killed most of the group but there were only five bodies.
“I was going through the jungle and then suddenly felt a drop of blood land on my arm.
“I quickly just fired into the tree and shot the person.
“When we were leaving I spotted something and though ‘I’m having that’.”
It’s at that point in the conversation Alan reaches into a living room cupboard and brings out an old Japanese flag.
“It had been wrapped around a machine gun,” he explains.
When asked how it makes him feel holding it now, he looks down at the flag, then back at me and shrugs.
“Well….I’m alive,” he says.
Preparation for Operation Zipper was all but complete when two days before the launch date, America dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.
Within 24 hours of Japan’s surrender he was flown to Kallang in Singapore to help with the surrender there.
“The Japanese soldiers were bowing at us,” Alan remembers, “It was strange.”
Alan is the last remaining member of the unit. He made headlines ten years ago meeting the then only other survivor Norman Hunt.
For more than 40 years he’s lived in Holbeach working as a wine merchant for most of those.
The keen boxing fan also enjoys his family, which gets ever bigger – Alan’s now a great, great grandfather – and his friend Nigel.
“He’s like part of the family now,” Alan continued “He’s a wonderful man.”
