The Merseyside Few is hugely indebted to South Lancashire Aviation for their work that is incorporated into these pages on Jindřich Bartoš.

Introduction

Jindřich Bartoš is one of the three Merseyside Few who are obviously not from Liverpool or Wirral. He is buried in West Derby Cemetery, section 11 RC grave 392 with a compatriot, Otto Hanzlíček.

West Derby Cemetery, in Lower House Lane, Croxteth [Google map], is a sprawling mass of graves, some well maintained some not. The cemetery was opened in January 1884 and consecrated six months later on 28th June. It has been used for both Church of England and Roman Catholic burials and a number of its buildings have been accorded a Grade II listed status.

Just inside the entrance is one of those signs showing a map of the cemetery and its sections. These things are never easy to follow as the sections themselves are not marked at all. It turned out that Bartos’s grave was about as far from the cemetery gates as you can get but I was pleased to see it was well maintained.

So who was Jindřich Bartoš and how did he come to be buried on Merseyside?

Background – Early Life

Jindřich Bartoš was born in Lugansk, south-eastern Ukraine (then in the Russian Empire) [Google map], on 16 November 1911.

The naming of his home town follows the ebb and flow of military power in the region. In 1938 Lugansk was renamed Voroshilovgrad in honour of the Soviet military commander Kliment Voroshilov but the original name was reinstated in 1958. It was changed back again following Voroshilov’s death in 1970, and finally returned to Lugansk as the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990.

It’s not clear when or why Jindřich Bartoš left Ukraine. He attended the Army Academy in Hranice and Prostějov [Google map] in Czechoslovakia – a neighbouring nation that did not exist at the time of his birth – and in 1934/35 graduated as a pilot. He served in that capacity with the 2nd Air Regiment. After Germany invaded Czechoslovakia in 1938 he escaped to Poland in the summer of 1939 and then sailed to France.

Battle of France

A Morane Saulnier MS-406 as flown by Jindřich Bartoš

As France was not yet at war with Germany, Bartoš was given a passport and, with other immigrants, expected to join the French Foreign Legion. Refusal to do so would have led to repatriation to Czechoslovakia. Once war was declared he was transferred to the Armee de l’Air.

There he became a participant of the Battle of France as a member of fighter squadron Groupe de Chasse I/3. At the outbreak of World War II, Groupe de Chasse I/3 had been equipped with the comparitively weak Morane-Saulnier MS.406. After seeing combat during the Phoney War, the squadron relocated to southern France. While at Cannes-Mandelieu on the Mediterranean coast [Google map], the unit converted to the new Dewoitine D.520 fighter, which was much more of a match for the German Messerschmitt Bf109.

When the Battle of France began in May 1940, it was the only unit to be operationally ready with the D.520, which it first took to battle on 12 May after hastily relocating to Wez-Thuisy in north eastern France, east of Paris, near the borders with Germany and Luxembourg.[Google map showing a satellite photograph on which you can see traces of the Battle of France runways].

A Dewoitine D-520 as flown by Jindřich Bartoš in a dogfight over Paris in June 1940

Groupe de Chasse I/3 was then based at Esbley, nearer Paris, [Google map] between 17 May and 18 June 1940. Flying a Dewoitine D.520 Bartoš engaged in a dogfight over Paris on 3 June 1940 and was shot down. He crash landed having sustained light wounds. He was credited with damaging his oppenent’s aircraft, a Heinkel He111.

In late June 1940, as the fall of France became inevitable, Groupe de Chasse I/3 crossed the Mediterranean to Oran in Algeria to escape capture. From thereBartoš sailed, via Casablanca on the Royal Scotsman and Gibraltar, where he transferred to the David Livingstone, for Britain where he landed in Cardiff on 5 August 1940. This is the same day and route that another of the Merseyside Few, Otto Hanzlíček, travelled. He would be posted to the same squadron as Bartoš six weeks later and both were destined to share the same grave.

It is not clear whether the men knew each other on the journey to Britain, or perhaps even whilst flying in France, but it’s easy to imagine that two Czechoslovakian pilots on the same long boat trip would find one another and have plenty to talk about.

The Battle of Britain

After retraining on Hurricanes, Pilot Officer Bartoš, RAF Service Number 83220, was posted to the newly formed No 312 (Czechoslovak) Squadron at RAF Duxford in Cambridgeshire on 5 September 1940.

No 312 (Czechoslovak) Squadron crest

No 312 was the second Czechoslovakian fighter unit and had been formed a week earlier on 29 August 1940 at the Czechoslovakian aircrew depot at RAF Cosford in Shropshire.

The squadron’s motto was ‘non multi sed multa’, meaning ‘not many but much’. The squadron badge was a stork volant, a reference to the French ‘Escadrille des Cygelines’ with whom the original pilots of the squadron had flown prior to coming to the UK.

Two days later on 31 August the first nine used Hawker Hurricanes Mk1 were flown into Duxford and on 4 September 1940 a Miles Master Mk1 arrived. Bartoš was among the Czechoslovakian airmen, flying personnel and ground staff who arrived at RAF Duxford during the afternoon of 5 September 1940. The squadron was based around experienced pilots who had already had combat experience during the Battle of France, many of whom had scored one victory or more.

On 6 September 1940, the pilots began with theoretical preparation for flying the Hurricanes and with training flights on the Master. The training was very slow because the unit had just the one trainer aircraft. For faster retraining of the pilots another Master was loaned from No 310 (Czechoslovak) Squadron.

On 19 September the squadron was joined by another of the Merseyside Few, Otto Hanzlíček.

After nearly a month the level of training was very high and on 26 September the squadron moved to its new home, the RAF station at Speke Airport, Liverpool. There the unit completed its retraining and in last days of September obtained further Hurricanes.

On 2 October 1940, No 312 (Czechoslovak) Squadron was declared operational and given the task was of protecting the Liverpool area from enemy raids.

In October 1940 Pilot Officer Bartoš became an operational pilot. At first he served as a section leader and after promotion to Flying Officer he was appointed deputy flight leader of B flight. On 10 October his squadron comrade and compatriot Otto Hanzlíček was killed after engine failure forced him to bail out into the Mersey.

Bartoš was part of a detachment sent to RAF Penrhos in North Wales [Google map] on 22 December 1940 to fend off attacks on the airfield by German bombers.

Death and Funeral

Taking off out of RAF Penrhos on 13 February 1941, Bartoš was flying Hawker Hurricane V6885 (DU*V) participating in mock dog fighting with Sergeant Votruba.

Sgt. Votruba of No 312 (Czechoslovak) Squadron

At 14:30 hours Bartoš’s aircraft was seen to go into a spin/dive from 5,000 feet by Sergeant Votruba. It crashed at Talacre near Prestatyn [Google map] on the mouth of the Dee opposite the end of the Wirral peninsula. The reason for the crash is unknown but it is thought that it was caused by failure of his oxygen equipment.

The accident was witnessed by Mr Frank Parsons and his friends who were at school at the time. They saw the Hurricanes swooping around in the sky over the nearby range, when suddenly one of the aircraft fell away and fluttered down like a leaf until it disappeared out of sight behind some trees.

Mr Parsons was one of the boys that the headmaster sent across to the crash to see what had happened. Upon arriving at the scene of the crash they saw the pilot’s body being removed from the cockpit by a number of locals including the district nurse and then being wrapped up in his parachute and placed alongside the wreck.

When a salvage crew arrived all non-essential persons were removed from the site and placed behind a wall. During the salvage operation the crew threw bits of the crashed Hurricane to the local children behind the wall. A Bell tent was placed in the garden of an adjacent holiday cottage to act as a guard post.

Mr Parsons and his friends recalled that the aircraft was buried up to its wings and sticking out of the ground at about 45 degrees with its tail in the air and was the correct way up.

Flying OfficerBartoš was buried with full military honours on 18 February 1941 in Liverpool West Derby Cemetery, section RC row 11 grave No 392. He shares this Sergeant Otto Hanzlíček. Representatives of the Czechoslovakian depot at RAF Wilmslow attended. Flying Officer Bartoš had approximately 863 flying hours to his credit, with 27 of these on Hurricanes.

Jindřich Bartoš was one of 89 Czechoslovakian airmen who fought in the Battle of Britain.

Jindřich Bartoš’s grave

The Crash Site Revisited

On 15 September 2002 a group of aviation archaeologists accompanied the schoolboy witnesses to the crash, Frank Parsons and his friends, to see if they could locate the site.

After four and a half hours of searching no trace of wreckage was found, but Mr Parsons and his friends were positive that the location was correct, and there was even the remains of a crater to be seen as the field had never been ploughed.

Jindřich Bartoš’ crash site

Prostějov Memorial

When the war ended, relatives of some of the 513 Czechoslovak airmen who died whilst serving in the RAF wanted the remains of their loved ones returned to Czechoslovakia for burial. When the practicalities of doing this were investigated Brigadier General Karel Janoušek, Head of the Czechoslovak Air Force in the UK, said it would be too expensive to exhume each body so suggested it would be better to have a symbolic exhumation instead.

A sample of soil from each of the airmens’ graves was taken and transported to Czechoslovakia to be placed into new urns before being formally interred. Graves left in the original cemeteries in the United Kingdom would have a standard type of British military headstone.

The urns from the British graves of Czechoslovak RAF airmen were moved to Prague. They were then stored in boxes whilst plans for an appropriate memorial were considered. In February 1948 the Communists took control of Czechoslovakia and those who had fought in the West for the freedom of their homeland now found themselves to be victims of persecution. Under this new regime the urns were simply forgotten.

On 15 January 1990, during the reconstruction of a National Monument at Vítkov, Prague, workmen discovered boxes which contained the 302 wooden urns. Unfortunately, due to poor storage conditions, 63 of the urns had rotted and their contents had mixed together. The mixed soil was placed in one communal urn. The contents of the remaining 239 urns were placed in new urns.

Jindřich Bartoš‘ urn is at the memorial at the Olšanský cemetry in Prague.

As with Wladyslaw Szulkowski, South Lancashire Aviation’s exhaustive site has a wealth of research on Jindřich Bartoš, and this forms much of the content on The Merseyside Few. Despite several attempts to contact them I received no reply, and I hope that my use of their material will be taken in a spirit of furthering the honouring of these pilots.

Asistance from the Free Czechoslovak Airforce Associates Ltd was tremendously helpful in pulling together material from a number of sources worldwide.  Take some time to look at their website.

Books:

The Battle of Britain Then and Now (Fifth Edition) – Winston G Ramsey
Battle Over Britain – Francis K Mason
Men of The Battle of Britain – Ken Wynn