On the 2. of March 2016 stridsminjar.is received a email from Mrs. Joan B. Stott, telling us that when going through some items and papers that belonged to her father, who had died in 2010. She came across two diaries that her father had kept in 1942/43 when he was stationed in Iceland as a wireless operator for the RAF. Corporal Ray Barker Royal Air Force was stationed at the transmitting station Artun (Ártúnshöfði) in Reykjavík working for Ferry Group.
She said she could find in his diaries references to lost aircraft coming from Greenland or The UK on their way to Iceland and crashed aircraft in Iceland. She said that she and her husband would be stopping for two days in Reykjavík in August and asked if we where interested in seeing these diaries and some photos. And that she would bring them with her and lend them to us. We met Mr. and Mrs. Stott in Reykjavík on the 1. of August 2016. They were on a the cruise ship Black Watch, traveling in the North Atlantic. We took them around Reykjavik. Showed them Artun were the transmitting station had been and some interesting sights in Reykjavik.
We have, now and then been looking at these diaries and our conclusion is that we will not gain more detailed information on crashed aircraft. But they do give insight to the life the soldiers led here during WWII. Joan’s father Corporal Ray Barker who later became a journalist wrote a article when he was stationed here about the ferry pilots which he called SOS. With Joan’s permission we would like to published here. These are photocopies of the original typed pages. The accompanying photos are from the diaries, “sleeping quarters” and “operations room”