FAMOUS SOLDIER MADE ESCAPE IN OTAGO AERO CLUB'S NEW AIRCRAFT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27383, 8 May 1950, Page 6

FAMOUS SOLDIER MADE ESCAPE IN OTAGO AERO CLUB'S NEW AIRCRAFT

The Auster Autocrat monoplane which has been bought by the Otago Aero Club and is at present being assembled in Wellington was once the personal aircraft of a particularly interesting soldier. Before being reconditioned and sold to the club, the Auster belonged to Colonel Bernard E. Fergusson, whose name will be well-known to anyone who has read the story of Brigadier Wingate’s Chindit raiders in Burma during the war.

This fact is made known in a letter which was recived by the secretary of the Aero Club from the firm which supplied the plane. They add that Colonel Fergusson is at present commanding the Black Watch Regiment of the British garrison in Berlin. “It will be obvious to you that he is always in the hottest possible spot,” states the letter. “When you have assembled and tested your machine, we would be grateful to have a report from you as to its behaviour, as he was and is extremely fond of it and we would like to send your report to him in West Berlin.” The Auster took part in one “ cloak and dagger ” incident of the post-war period, for it %vas the actual plane in which Colonel Fergusson flew the famous Commando, Captain Roy Farran, out of Palestine, where the Israeli forces had put a price on his head. Colonel Fergusson was the author of “ Beyond the Chindwin,” one of the many books written on the Chindit activities in Burma, and he is mentioned frequently in all such books. He was a junior Intelligence officer under Wingate's command in Palestine during the 1938 revolts. Posted to Fieldmarshall Wavell's staff, he served as liaison officer with the Turks, as a forward observation officer with the

Free French during the Syrian campaign, and as a regimental officer in Tobruk. He became personal secretary to Field-Marshal Wavell in India, and subsequently asked to be relieved from his post at GHQ to join Wingate as a column leader with the Burma raiding forces. In his book “Wingate Adventure,” W G. Burchett writes: “ Fergusson used to be the delight of American troops around Delhi. To them, he was the screen version of an inane ‘huntin , shootin’, and fishin’ ” type of Englishman. With a fierce, wide, bushy blonde moustache, a carriage so erect that the back of his head, neck and spine seem to continue in one straight line, Fergusson caps everything off by by sporting a monocle firmly screwed into his left eye. But one would be advised not to pass too hasty judgment on Bernard Fergusson, at least not till one has taken note of the steely glint which on occasions enters his normally mild blue eyes . . . Some of his exploits still run the rounds of Delhi clubs and messes . . . Just where Colonel Fergusson used his Auster has not been stated in the letter from the sales concern, but it must at least have been during his post-war service in troubled Palestine and in Berjin. Its future activities are likely to be less picturesque, but the Otago Aero Club has certainly acquired a plane with an interesting history.