MUNKEY – MUNK (Apologies to Stanley Holloway)
You’ve ‘eard of 112 per’aps of Western Desert fame
‘oo braved the Eastern mysteries to earn their bloody name.
At ‘Munkey-Munk’ they fought & bled till battle came to stop
And only aircraft left on line were won with busted prop.
Some lost their wings-some lost their tails but ‘It is’ lost by far
For though we flew to Munkey-Munk, we did come back by car.

By F/O Acworth DFC - Oct.1940

MONKEY MONKEY (To Kipling’s ‘IF’)
The last day of October 1940
was history for the few of 112
And just before the luncheon hour a call came
direct from Operations 202
“Two Austins scramble Monkey Monkey quickly,
12 Bandits flying north, height eighteen thou’”
And once again two clouds of dust departed
And two minds thought their first chance might be now.
Twelve ‘It is’ in two waves of six approaching,
One can’t believe it true, they’ve come at last –
And down we dived full out in chase of raiders
For all know well a GLAD’ is far from fast
Each ‘Glad’ attacked a wave of ‘Seventy Nine S’.
And shot away two thousand rounds of lead
And down came two with engines pouring black smoke
And doubtless all the personnel were dead.
Poor ‘Happy’ never lived to tell his story
But living still’s his famous Happy smile
And then two waves of five fast moving ‘bandits’
Twelve ‘Forty Twos’ escorting all the while.
And then three Hurricanes attacked the last wave
And down came two or three more ‘Seventy Nines’.
Two Glads collided and a third shot down but
All pilots landed safely ‘hind our lines’
But not before 3 ‘forty twos’ went spinning
To hit the desert sand and burst in flames.
We won the day by Five to Seven airframes
But what is more eighteen to two in names.
And so more blood is spilt by human folly
And sweat just wasted building aeroplanes.

Written by S/L J. Fraser after the First Victory at Mersa Matruh on 31st October 1940.

Iinformation kindly provided by Rob Brown.