Shirley was impressed. Then she was annoyed at herself for thinking of him at all. She tried to dismiss the enigmatic Denson from her mind. Later, however, her brother introduced them. Denson it turned out came from Burnley, Lancashire which was not far from the market town of Chorley where Shirley lived with her parents in some style in a manor house.
The ball marked the end of term at Cranwell and Denson was travelling back to Lancashire the following day to spend some time with his parents. On an impulse, Shirley offered him a lift home. Denson accepted, subject to the agreement of her father who, knowing Cranwell ‘do’s’ tended to go on all night, had retired to one of the dormitories. As the night wore on, the young couple found themselves sharing almost every dance. Shirley made a point of finding out everything she could of her new beau.
Denson came from humble origins, but had won a scholarship to the prestigious Colne and Nelson grammar school where he excelled. He was one of that rare breed who could combine a first-class brain with outstanding achievement on the sports field. He was captain of both the athletic and boxing teams, and his tutors thought he could achieve anything he put his mind to. And when he brought in a series of top-grade ‘A’ levels, they said he could have his pick of universities, even Oxford or Cambridge.
But young Eric had other ideas. Ever since he was a small boy he wanted to be a pilot in the RAF. As a schoolboy during World War II, he would often lie on his back in the fields surrounding his home town and watch the fighter squadrons returning to their Yorkshire bases after skirmishes with the Luftwaffe. He dreamed of being up there with them, high in the sky defending his country against the evil invader. More than anything in the world, Eric Denson wanted to be one of ‘the few.’
It was therefore no surprise when he shunned the overtures of the more prestigious universities and applied instead to go to Cranwell.
He was accepted immediately and his unique talents ensured he was fast-tracked for pilot officer training. Shirley recalled: “According to his colleagues, Eric was a natural; he took to flying like a duck to water and was marked down very early on to get to the top. He was only 20 when I met him, but he was mature way beyond his years.”
After the ball, which went on until dawn, Shirley’s father drove the small party back to Lancashire. Shirley slept all the way in Eric’s lap.
She recalled: “Eric came to my home and I made us all bacon and eggs. By this time it seemed we’d known each other for ever, and we sat talking for hours. I had never met anyone like him; he had this sort of old world charm that I found very attractive. He talked for hours about the Battle of Britain and how close we had been to defeat. It was all very patriotic stuff, but that’s the way we talked in those days. We were immensely proud of our country. I felt safe in his hands, and I knew that Britain had every reason to be proud of men like him. He was quite literally willing to lay his life down for his country, he loved it that much.”
Shirley lived in a large, rambling seven-bedroom house surrounded by fields and woodland. There were stables, and Shirley had her own pony. There was a swimming pool, a rarity in those days. By contrast, Eric lived in a little two-up and two-down in one of the poorer districts of Burnley. But it made no difference to Shirley, who recalled: “Eric had very special qualities; he was the stuff of heroes. I had several boyfriends, but no-one compared to him. I couldn’t stop thinking about him, and was sad when he had to go back to Cranwell.”
The romance blossomed in letters and phone calls in the months that followed. By the time of the next Cranwell ball Shirley, always very single minded, had made up her mind. “The funny thing is that I always told daddy I wouldn’t marry a pilot because they were always being sent off somewhere. But with Eric it didn’t seem to matter. I decided he was the only man for me, and I was determined to get him. I know that sounds shameless, but I have always been a great believer in the old adage that all’s fair in love and war.”
The couple soon became inseparable. He visited her at home every weekend. Shirley said: “We were madly in love, but we never made love. We both felt it wouldn’t be right until we were married. Eric said he would never betray my father’s trust. Daddy knew this and respected Eric enormously for it.”
In early 1954 Eric received his much-coveted “wings” and he passed out with honors as a fully-fledged pilot at a colourful ceremony at Cranwell. Six months later Shirley and Eric were married in a traditional ceremony, complete with honour guard, in an English country church near Shirley’s home.
But there was no conventional honeymoon. Eric, as one of Cranwell’s rising stars was already involved in some very secret work which necessitated staying on site at the base. Eric would never talk about his work; all Shirley knew was that he had been inducted into the Canberra squadrons, which included patrolling the edges of the iron curtain countries.
The mid-1950s was a period of intense fear and paranoia as the world watched the two superpowers squaring up to each other. America and the Soviet Union seemed to be hell-bent on destroying the planet as they vied with each other to produce bigger and ever-more fearsome weapons of mass destruction.
America was laying waste to huge tracts of the South Pacific Ocean as it detonated ever more fearsome thermonuclear weapons. The Soviet Union was doing much the same thing in the vast wastes of Siberia and the Arctic Circle. Britain was desperately trying to hang on to their coat-tails by testing its own nuclear devices in the Australian outback.
Into this feverish maelstrom were thrown pilots like Eric Denson who were being trained to fly the planes that would deliver Britain’s nuclear response should the Soviets launch an attack. They had to be on standby 24 hours a day and the aircraft of choice was the Canberra which was capable of flying higher and at faster speeds than almost any other aircraft in service at the time.
Eric Denson took to flying the Canberra as though born to it. He was soon leading training squadrons and he excelled at penetrating the defensive radar screens of other forces. Low-level and night operations were given special priority.
On one occasion Denson caused a minor diplomatic incident when he made a low-level run that took the US air force base at Lakenheath completely by surprise. To rub salt into the wound, he cheekily flew back over the base on his return… all without being detected.
The Canberra squadrons remained Britain’s first line of attack until 1957 when the huge new Valiant bombers came into operation. But the military still had plans for the Canberras… and for Eric Denson.
On the ground, Shirley got on with life as best she could. She recalled: “We were constantly on the move. We never had our own home and had to rent wherever we went. But we made the best of things. Eric was always busy and he was away an awful lot. The Cold War was intensifying and he seemed to be permanently in the air. I can still remember there was real fear at the time that the world was going to come to an end. By that time we had all seen the dreadful consequences of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. We were in the front line, and the threat of destruction was all pervasive. Eric was performing a vital part in defending our country. We were willing to put up with any inconvenience and no sacrifice seemed too great. I was very much in love with my husband and very proud about what he was doing. I worried about him all the time and I used to make a point of watching for his squadron returning to base. Eric always tried to fly over our cottage at the end of the runway, just to reassure me.”
The couple was based back at Cranwell in 1957 when Denson suddenly received an urgent message. Shirley said: “There was a flap on over something and Eric was required for urgent duties. Before I knew it we were off again, this time to the big base at Basingbourne in Kent. I had to give up the little job I had managed to get at the local university and I even had to give away a gorgeous little red setter puppy Eric had bought me. But life was like that and we just accepted it. We packed our things and off we went. I was never told what all the fuss was about. All Eric would say was that he had to train for a special operation. He looked extremely worried for quite some time.