Pride of Australia: Victor Harbor man and WWII fighter pilot Norm Ginn, 91, a true community hero
VICTOR Harbor resident Norm Ginn faced a firing squad during Word War II so anything life has thrown at him since has been a breeze.
NORM Ginn faced a firing squad during Word War II so anything life has thrown at him since has been a breeze.
The 91-year-old Victor Harbor resident has made good use of his 70-year reprieve — the firing squad was psychological torture used by German interrogators determined to break him- and is still living life to the full.
It’s takes a remarkable person to be nominated for a Pride of Australia award but few are as qualified as the former air radio operator who still plays golf and bowls twice a week in his paradise by the sea.
Known fondly around the Fleurieu Peninsula as ‘Stormin Normin’ the former Victorian is regarded as a community treasure.
For the past 34 years he has tended the gardens at the South Coast District Hospital.
Norm and Betty, his wife of 66-years, chose to retire to South Australia from Victoria — Betty’s home state — in 1979.
“I needed something to keep me active and busy and the gardening has been just the job,” Norm said.
“I’m not getting any younger and I’ve got another guy to help me now who is really good so it’s a bit easy on me.”
A member of the remarkable 460 Air Squadron based at Binbrook in Lincolnshire during World War II, Norm made 15 sorties over Germany before his aircraft was shot down during the Battle of Berlin and he was forced to use his parachute.
“You’ve seen so many of your colleagues bail out before that you just get to realise your turn will come,” Norm said.
“Unfortunately our pilot and another crew member didn’t make it but the rest of us landed safely.”
Norm spent four days on the run in Nazi Germany before being captured and taken to a special interrogation centre where he was pushed day and night for vital details of a new allied radio system.
Being dragged before a firing squad was a last effort to break him.
“I really thought I was about to die and had accepted my fate,” Norm said.
“I didn’t give up any information though.”
He spent the remainder of the war in the notorious 4B Stalag prisoner of war camp near Dresden.
The Russians liberated the camp but left the prisoners to fend for themselves for a month before rounding them up and imprisoning them again.
Not waiting to take their chances, Norm and four mates broke out and made it to the safety of the American line.
A talented cricketer who played for an Australian representative team at Lords, Norm is a regular volunteer at the hospital, the bowls club and the golf club where he used to play off a handicap of 11.
“I’m my own handicap these days with the golf and play off 29,” he added.
“But it’s just good to get out in the sunshine and we chose a great place to do that.”