- Contributed by听
- Chrissymas
- People in story:听
- Wilfred Harry Perry
- Location of story:听
- Downham Market and Germany
- Background to story:听
- Royal Air Force
- Article ID:听
- A2055188
- Contributed on:听
- 17 November 2003
WILFRED HARRY PERRY, Lye, Stourbridge.
On the 18th November 1943 at 5.00 PM my father, Wilfred Harry Perry Aged 30 took off from Downham Market Airfield enroute to a bombing mission in Germany. The Stirling aircraft No EE884 passed over Frankfurt and was caught in many searchlights. The pilot tried to shake off the lights without success and turned south towards Mannheim. Six German aircraft were spotted by my father behind the Stirling, but were then shot up by a solo German fighter who came from in front and under the Stirling.
The Stirling was so damaged that the word came to abandon the aircraft. The bomb aimer parachuted through the bomb bay, but the six other crew including my father did not have time to don parachutes and escape. They crashed at 8.15 PM near a small village north of Mannheim. The six crew were killed.
This information was given by the sole survivor who wrote a letter to my mother after he was released from captivity in 1945. My mother who was 4 months pregnant with me, never remarried and passed away in March 2003 aged 90. Obviously I never knew my father.
To continue:- In the past 3 months I have been trying to piece together what happened when the Stirling crashed. To my amazement I am in contact with a German who is now 76 years old, but was 16 at the time, who witnessed the crash.
He said "The aircraft tried to crash land but lost a wheel and veered into electric cables and came to rest. The local people decided to leave the aircraft until daylight and removed the remains of the 6 crew. They buried the six crew in the village cemetery only 100 yards away, with a simple cross with the inscription "Here Lies Six English Fliers" and the local women laid flowers on the graves".
Several years later the crew were exhumed and taken to Durnbach Commonwealth War Cemetery (Bavaria) to finally rest.
It is the 60th Anniversary on the 18th November 2003 of this last mission and the loss of six young men including my father.
Incidentally the German witness has taken photographs of the exact crash site as it is today and the churchyard where the burial took place. He has also placed an article in a German newspaper complete with my photographs of the aircraft and my father..
GOD BLESS WILF AND THE REST OF THE CREW.
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