Flt Lt Bill Spence, Lancaster bomb aimer who became a successful romantic novelist – obituary

Flight Lieutenant Bill Spence, who has died aged 101, completed 36 operations as a Lancaster bomb aimer. Later in life he became a successful novelist, and he had 76 books published under various pseudonyms.

During his bomber training he teamed up with his pilot Mike Wood, a Rhodesian. In August 1944 they were posted to 44 (Rhodesia) Squadron, based near Lincoln.

On August 29 1944 they flew their first operation. The target was Königsberg in east Prussia and one at the extreme range for a Lancaster. Cloud cover resulted in a delay over the target of 20 minutes to allow the Pathfinder force to mark the target accurately. The force encountered heavy anti-aircraft fire, and 15 Lancasters were lost, but the raid was one of the most successful by Bomber Command.

After the attack, it was Spence’s duty as bomb aimer to check that the bomb bay was clear. During his inspection he discovered that the bomber had been hit and was losing hydraulic fluid. On arrival back at base, the loss of fluid required the undercarriage to be pumped down manually. 

Dense fog prevented them landing at base and they were sent to nearby Fiskerton, which was one of a few airfields equipped with a fog dispersal device. This consisted of two pipelines running along both sides of the runway, through which fuel was pumped into burner jets positioned at intervals. The fuel vapours were lit from a series of burners, producing walls of flame along the length of runway. They landed safely, with minimal fuel, after being in the air for over 11 hours.

The son of a teacher, William John Duncan Spence was born on April 20 1923, and brought up and educated in Middlesbrough. After leaving school, he began training as a teacher at the Roman Catholic Training College in Twickenham, where he joined the RAF section of the Officer Training Corps.

After two years, he was called up into the RAF. He trained as a bomb aimer in Canada before beginning his tour in Bomber Command.

His second operation was to bomb a V-2 storage site in the Pas de Calais. By mid-September 1944, Bomber Command had returned to its strategic campaign against targets in Germany. On September 18, Spence bombed Mönchengladbach with Guy Gibson, of Dam Buster fame, as the master bomber. Gibson and his navigator were lost returning to base.

During November, Spence bombed the Mittelland and Dortmund-Ems canals. Oil targets became a high priority and Spence attacked the synthetic oil plants at Pölitz, Brüx and Böhlen. His aircraft was one of the first to drop their bombs on Dresden on February 13 1945. He always maintained that the city was a legitimate target and distrusted the judgment of those who did not take part in the operation.

In the closing months of the war, he flew seven operations dropping mines in the Kattegat and the approaches to the Baltic to prevent the German Navy, particularly the new generation of U-boats, from passing into the Atlantic Ocean to harass Allied shipping and convoys.

His 36th and final operation was a daylight attack on April 4 1945 against Nordhausen. At the end of their tour, his pilot Mike Wood was awarded the DFC.

After the war, Spence worked at Ampleforth College controlling stores for the catering side. He always had an ambition to write, and his breakthrough came in 1958 when his first novel, Dark Hell, based on his wartime experiences, was published. He then turned to writing westerns for Hales Publishing under the pseudonym Jim Bowden, after the first Canadian base where he was stationed. He wrote over 30 westerns before turning to other topics.

Following visits to Whitby, he became interested in the history of whaling, and wrote a definitive history of the industry, Harpooned (1980), and a historical novel, The Red Shawl, billed as “a passionate saga of the Whitby sailors and the women they left behind”.

His publisher Piatkus liked the theme but wanted it to be written by a female author and, as Spence said in many interviews, “You don’t say no to a publisher”, so Jessica Blair, his new alter ego, was born in 1990. He preferred to classify his stories as “historical sagas” rather than romantic novels as, he explained, “there is romance in practically every category of novel”. He went on to write 26 Jessica Blair novels, many set in his native North Yorkshire. His last romantic saga was published when he was 95, after which he decided it was time to retire and use his computer to catalogue his vast book collection, download music and visit online art galleries.

For 50 years he wrote articles and ran a book review column for the Malton Gazette & Herald. Together with his wife Joan, he wrote four books on North Yorkshire. He belonged to the Romantic Novelists’ Association and was nominated in 2014 for its epic romantic novel of the year.

Spence was a lifelong supporter of Middlesbrough FC and attended home games whenever possible. He was a keen cricketer and captained his village team for several years in addition to supporting Yorkshire.

Bill Spence married, in September 1944, Joan Ludley of Ampleforth. She died in 1999. He is survived by a son and two daughters. A third daughter predeceased him.

Bill Spence, born April 20 1923, died May 28 2024