630 SQUADRON

LE-S

11/12 MAY 1944

On the 11th May the Lancaster, based at East Kirkby, took off at 22.28 hours on a mission to bomb marshalling  at Bourg Leopold (Belgium).
According to reports of survivors from that night, there was a lot of confusing and they were not able to pin point their target.
Therefore they decided to turn back to East Kirkby.

 Around 23.45 hrs, the ME737 crossed a  German night fighter ( we think it was Heinz Rökker from the 2./NJG2) .
Soon it was clear that it was an uneven battle and almost immediate  two engines were shot in to flames. P/O Watt knew the plane could not be saved. According to eye-witnesses the burning plane flew two times around the city Herenthout, Belgium.
Possibly to give all the crew enough time to save themselves, Sgt Witham en F/S Stuart made grateful use of that.

Sgt Witham recalls “ There was a security leak and the mission was called off  at the last moment, the message did not reach us because there was strict radio silence. We were sitting ducks. We could see that there were no pathfinder markers and we thought we were early .Then all hell let lose . The bomb aimer and me parachuted out of the burning plane ,the blast of the explosion as the plane hit the ground tossed my parachute about”

On 12th May around 00.20, the ME737 with 5 crewmembers crashed on a field next to the Itegemsesteenweg, on ca 1.5Km from Herenthout. From reports from witnesses it was a huge explosion, seen from miles away. For the 5 remaining crewmembers all help was lost.

Thanks to pilot P/O Watt a big catastrophe was avoided, he still managed to crash an nearly uncontrollable Lancasterinto a field next to the town center of Herenthout.
If the ME737, still containing his load of bombs,  would have crashed in the town center, the disaster would have been immense.
These 5 crewmembers gave their lives to save hundreds of citizens.

P/O Watt                              Pilot                 RNZAF
Sgt. L. St. C. Thompson     Navigator       RAFVR
Sgt. P. Amies                       Air Gunner      RAFVR
Sgt. A.F. Grant.                   Air Gunner      RCAF
Sgt. P.R. Rowthorn            Air Gunner      RAFVR

The 2 surviving crewmembers :

Sgt. R.V.C. Witham           Wireless Op.   RAFVR
F/S K.A.M. Stuart             Bomb Aimer    RNZAF

In April 2011 we did the full recovery of the crash site, we are trying to put up a memorial for this crew.
Thanks to : Neil Smith and Pete Gulliver from 51 History team  for finding the family members of the crew

Researchers : Wim Govaerts  , Luc Cox   , Chris Van Kerckhoven , Colin Mitchell-Smith (Archivist atEast Kirkby) , Allen Hudson  (Ex Airgunner from 57 SQN) , Cynrik De Decker , Didier Jadot

Eyewitness reports: Gaston Verheyen  ,Leo Janssens, Boni Wouters (+)

Planehunters : Thijs Hellings ,Mark “Max” Verwimp, Kris Vanturnhout, Marcel Hermes ,Jan Jacobs (+) (helpers Steven Volkaerts, Luc Cox, Stefan Van Tichelt ,Steven Van Hemelen (foto’s))

Special thanks to help us with the full recovery:

BAHAAT, BOM.BE ,ALL ARCHEO ,my wife Freya for bringing us food and coffee. the people of Herenthout , Dovo , Politie , Vlaamse Overheid

And last but not least Laurence Featherstone ,family member of Sgt. Rowthorn who was with us on the dig.

Regards

Benny Ceulaers

51 SQUADRON

LK-L

22/23 OCTOBER 1943

RAF Snaith ,22 October 1943,17.55 hours the Halifax JN920 takes of to bomb the industrial town of Kassel

Hit by flak over Holland the crippled plane burning violently.

Eyewitnesses talking about the crash many years later still remembers the burning plane circling the town.

A few minutes later the plane crashed in a forest with  a enormous explosion , killing the seven brave young men.

Flt./Sgt.  C.E. Hall            Pilot               RCAF

Sgt. G.H. Bennett             Navigator       RAF

Sgt. R.S. Sitch                  Wireless Op.  RAF

Sgt. J.C. Cowie                 Air Gunner    RAF

Sgt. T.V. Lewis                Air Gunner    RAF

Sgt. M.S. Williams           Flight En.      RAF

Sgt. E. Parker                   Bomb Aimer  RAF  

The following morning the Germans sealed of the crash site.

In 1998 members of the Wings Museum did a recovery on the crash site (check http://www.wingsmuseum.co.uk/halifax_jn920_memorial.htm )

In 2010 the Planehunters visited the crash site , the landowner gave his permission to search the crater edge and we found some nice pieces just at the surface .

Special thanks to Neil Smith and Peter “Pete” Gulliver from 51 History Team

Researchers : Luc Cox, the East Surry Aviation Group at the Wings Museum

Eyewitness reports: Herman Wijgerde (who put a model of a Halifax next to the memorial)

The Landowners who let us investigate this 51 Sqn. crash site.

Thijs Hellings for his hard work and a fresh Duvel.

Regards

Benny Ceulaers

51 SQUADRON

LK-L

28/29 JUNE 1943

Shot down by Night Fighter Lt. Gunther Franz 5.NJG1. on the return from a bombing mission to Cologne at about 02.23 h.

The plane crashed close to Olen (Belgium) in the hamlet of “Gerheiden”

Local resident André Brankaerts (+) recalled: “We wore awakened by a tremendous noise.

We stormed out of the house and just saw an enormous plane going down, the left wing was on fire, all the trees were on fire from the fuel that run out of the wing”

Six of the crewmembers did not survive, namely

P/O J.P. Tay                  Pilot                      RAFVR

Sgt. A.C. Redshaw        Bomb Aimer        RAFVR

Sgt. A. Smith                 Flight Engineer    RAF

Sgt. W.C. Butler            Air Gunner            RAFVR

W/O A.E. Vidal            Air Gunner             RCAF

P/O J.L.R. Houlston      Wireless Op.        RAF

Two crewmembers left the burning plane on time

P/O T.H. Popley            Navigator             RAFVR

Sgt. D.R.G.  Eldridge    2^nd Pilot                RAFVR

Sgt. Eldridge was successful in his escape ,he fell in to the hands of the secret army. With the help of the “Comet Line” he made it back to England.

P/O Popley was captured by the Germans.

We have the full report of what happened that night above Olen, please contact me if you wont more information

On August 8 2009 we put up a memorial for the crew (see “Monuments”)

Special thanks to Neil Smith an Peter Gulliver from 51 History team

Researchers :Chris Van Kerkchoven ,Peter Celis ,Cynrik De Decker ,Luc Cox, Wim Govaerts

Planehunters : Jan Jacobs(+), Thijs Hellings ,Kris Vanturnhout , Mark “Max” Verwimp

Eyewitness reports: Louis Baetens , Maria Van Houdt , André Brankaerts (+)

And my very special friend Boni Wouters (+)

Regards

Benny Ceulaers

From left to rigtht : Sgt. Rowthorne  – Sgt. Prettejones (replaced on 11-12 May by Sgt. Witham)  – F/Sgt. Stuart   – P/O Watt -
  Sgt Amies  – Sgt. Thompson – Sgt. Grant  .

This photo was taken at RAF Winthorpe 1661 HCE on Feb/March 1944

(Photo Wim Govaerts )

The plane in the photograph is not the one that this crew was flying when they were shot down.  I believe the crew photo was actually taken in the US just before they left for England.  They had just picked up their new B17 and were ready to leave. 

This B17 was named Patricia after the pilot’s wife, Patricia Mutschler.  The crew flew this plane on their early missions, during which time it was heavily damaged.  The crew was then re-assigned to Patches, the B17 they were flying when shot down on August 17.

My information tells me- based on a letter from one of the surviving crew members – that Mutschler had re-named Patches to Patricia, and had actually painted the Patricia name on one side of the nose – leaving Patches on the other.  Evidently, according to the crewman, everyone still called the plane Patches, regardless of what Lt. Mutschler wanted.

1st Lieut.  Adolph Gluntz (Addi) – JG-26-7 (Knights Cross & Oak Leaves)

He had 71 victory’s of which 21 were on 4 engined bombers.

He flew a FW-190

B17 “Patches”

The Crew of the B17 “Patches”

When Michel told me about the crash, we immidietly started looking for all the neccesary information.

Also thanks to Jhonny Janse and Chris Van Kerckhoven we came to the conclusion that it had to be B-17 “Patches” from the 8th AIR FORCE 30 B.G. 365 SQ.

The B-17 site was already know,  and there was told that we would not find much anymore of the plane.

On a sunny 16 Julie 2006 we deceided to make an attempt to find the plane. After a whole afernoon of intense searching we did not find anything.

Beneath the Weefberg, there were  two older men, enyoing the sun.  I asked them of the by any chance knew anything about the crash.

Both gentelmen starting telling stories like it all happend yesterday. Afer more then an hour listinging to their intresting stories they pointed out the exact place of the crash plane,  or what would be left of it since it exploded before hitting the ground.

With new courauge we started the detecting again, and after a very short while we found the first pieces of allinium on a depth of 20 cm. At the same spot we receoved some electric wiring and the most important, the ID tag.

Because it was getting late, we deceiced to abort the recovery.

After doing some research we found out that the pieces came from the back of the engines.

Because i not yet have recoverd much parts of the B17, there are some photo’s of the

”Schweinfurt Raid ” from  17/08/’43 included with the photo’s from  ”Patches ”.

Benny Ceulaers

Many thanks to Michel Truzskowski , Jhonny Janse ,Chris Van Kerckhoven and all other eye-witnesses  in Testelt.