Remembrance ceremony held at RAF Welford for those lost in bomber accident in WWII

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Brian Stives
  • 501st Combat Support Wing Public Affairs
ROYAL AIR FORCE WELFORD, United Kingdom --  Members of the 420th Munitions Squadron held a remembrance ceremony for eight Airmen attached to the Royal Air Force's 101st Squadron Nov. 9 at the Memorial Grove on RAF Welford.

The annual service is led by the Ridgeway Military and Aviation Research Group and the Parachute Regiment Association and is held as close as possible to National Remembrance Sunday.

"From the very first service of remembrance, this has been a civilian event with a military presence," said Alan Bovingdon-Cox, Ridgeway Military and Aviation Research Group president. "The format preserves the peace of the Memorial Grove while demonstrating our international military alliance."

According to the research group, those eight aircrew were part of a raid on Nuremburg, Germany, in 1944 in which more than a quarter of the 101st Squadron Lancaster Airmen were killed. What the Airmen participating in the raid did not know is the German Luftwaffe's nightfighters were equipped with a new weapon allowing the fighter to position below the bombers, out of sight from the gunners, and fire at close range. In the first 60 minutes since crossing the German border, 59 Lancaster and Halifax bombers were shot down. After the raid, the planned route home ended near Reading where the stream would disperse and the 101st Squadron Lancasters would head for Ludford Magna.

What makes those eight Airmen, a crew composed of Australian, Canadian and British forces, unique is they were the last to perish in the raid. A little after 5 a.m., an explosion awoke the base of the American 435th Troop Carrier Group whose four C-47 squadrons were based at RAF Welford in 1944. At first an air raid was suspected but it soon became clear that a crashing aircraft caused the blast. As the bomber, serial number DV290, approached RAF Welford, it hit the ground in a 30-degree dive from an overcast sky.

The Memorial Grove at RAF Welford was established in 1993.