BIGGLES IN THE BALTIC
Book First Published in June 1940 - 256 pages
This story was first published, in eleven weekly parts, as
STORM-TROOP OF THE BALTIC SKIES in The War Thriller issues 579 to 589, dated 9th March
1940 to 18th May 1940
This book MUST have been written after
“Biggles in the South Seas” although it was published in book form three months
before that book. “Biggles in the
Baltic” starts with the announcement of war with Germany, an event which
occurred on 3rd September 1939.
Johns must have written that book on or after that date. There is no way that he could have written
“Baltic” AND then written “South Seas” and had “South Seas” typeset and ready
for publication in “The Gem” on 14th October 1939. I imagine that the publishers wanted to get a
“Second World War” story out as soon as possible. The original first edition of “Biggles in the
Baltic” is subtitled “A Tale of the Second Great War”.
This is the original first edition dust jacket. This one is price clipped but the original
price was 4/-
This is the dust jacket for the 1940 “thin” edition. The original price was again 4/-
This is the dust wrapper for a later edition than the first. I think it must be one of the 1941 editions
as the dust wrapper lists ‘Spitfire Parade’ published in August 1941.
I believe the price of this reprint dust jacket to be 4 shillings,
which would have been the same price as that on the original first edition dust
wrapper.
CHAPTERS
Click on any chapter for a summary of the events in that chapter or
see the general story summary below
As the
momentous words "England is now, therefore, in a state of war with
Germany" came sombrely over the radio, Biggles knows that they are all in
for another spot of war flying. Almost immediately Air Commodore Raymond is in
touch. He is back at his old job in Air Intelligence and has a proposal for
Biggles. Britain has purchased from a neutral country a small island called
Bergen Ait in the Baltic Sea, which has a huge cave inside. This has already
been fitted out as an air base and fully stocked with supplies. Biggles, Algy
and Ginger, together with Flight Sergeant Smyth, his son Roy (as wireless
operator) and Raymond's old cook William Salt (known as 'Briny'), form 'Z'
Squadron and are taken to the Baltic island by submarine. Their four aircraft
are already there and are all given Australian names as they intend to strike
and return like Boomerangs. Ginger's is called Dingo, Algy goes for Didgeree-du
and Biggles calls his aircraft Willie-Willie. The fourth plane, a spare,
is named the Duck-billed platypus. Various dangerous missions take place.
A German U-boat, U159, arrives and has to be quickly sunk before it can give
away the position of their base. This has a particularly fortunate side effect
when the German codebook is washed ashore amongst the debris. A German Dornier
flying boat follows and has to be shot down, but not before Ginger's plane is
hit. Ginger lands in the sea and Biggles lands to pick him up. The Dingo
is set alight in order to destroy it. Weather conditions prevent them all from
returning to their base and so both Algy and Biggles, with Ginger on board, fly
to the first available land, which is a sandbank. They soon discover they are
on German soil and find the German liner Leipzig, now being used as a
troop ship, hidden in a channel. When the weather improves they all return to
Bergen Ait but find that Briny has disappeared. Convinced that our heroes were
down on the water he had set off in a boat to look for them. The following day,
Biggles and Algy split up and set off to look for Briny. Algy finds Briny
stranded on the same sandbank they had previously landed on, whilst Biggles
separately finds his boat by a neutral ship. Landing, Biggles is captured by
none other than Erich von Stalhein himself, who is flying a false flag.
Biggles' aircraft is destroyed and Algy later finds the wreckage. Meanwhile
Ginger goes exploring a cave at the back of their island base and finds himself
stranded at the top of the island. Biggles is taken to the Leipzig and
tried and sentenced to be shot. He is saved when Algy torpedoes the Leipzig.
Biggles swims back to the sandbank where he unexpectedly meets Algy who has
come to blow up a German supply depot there. An exhausted Biggles is returned
to Bergen Ait where Algy leaves him to sleep whilst he, Algy, continues with
the destruction of the depot. Biggles wakes up to find von Stalhein standing
over him! The Germans have found and taken their base! Algy returns and is
forced to land on top of the island where he meets up with Ginger. Smyth, Briny
and Roy have all taken refuge in the cave at the back of the base, which leads
them eventually to Ginger and Algy. Ginger returns to the base in time to see
Biggles about to be shot and manages to open fire and get him away. Our heroes
are reunited. Biggles blows up an underground lake in order to destroy their
base and wash away the Germans. Algy tries to take off but crashes in the sea.
A British submarine arrives in order to collect the German codebook and this is
enough to see the remaining Germans off. Algy then uses a captured German
flying boat to drop parachutes to our heroes stranded at the top of the island
after the explosion. They use these to jump off and are collected from the sea
by Algy who then flies them all home to England.
Click here to see the story illustrations from the original HARDBACK first edition of this book
Click here to see different illustrations from a Dutch version of this book
Biggles in the Baltic
Publication Details - published by Oxford University Press
The spine and cover illustrations from the original Oxford first
edition
The first edition of this book has an asterisk * on the title
page. This normally denotes a reprint
but in this case, uniquely, it is the first edition that has it.
Frontispiece
Click on the above to see it in more detail