The Reeve’s
Tale magazine website
Mosquito
KB364 crashes on Bawdeswell's church
It was one of twelve aircraft
from 608 Squadron which set out from Bexwell,
The attack commenced as planned, five minutes ahead of the two other
raids at 19.25 hours. The Mosquitos dropped a mixture of red and green
target indicators and high explosive bombs from 25,000ft. A few searchlights
and very light flak were reported by crews over
Eleven of the Mosquitoes from 608 Squadron carried out successful
missions and returned safely to
Cloud and icing conditions were
encountered . KB364 is thought to have become severely iced-up during the
return descent through cloud over
The Dereham Fire Brigade and firefighters from the American airbase at
Attlebridge (Weston Longville) attended and it took four hours to control the
blaze.
Stephanie Leitch (nee
Bugdale) was 8yrs old at the time, living at Kenway cottage in the Street -
"I remember seeing one of
the plane's wheels, on fire, rolling down the street towards us. Since
this was a few moments after the impact - we had time to come out to see the
source of the noise - the wheel must have landed on the roof of Barwick House
and from there rolled down onto the road.
There was, incidentally, a fire appliance behind
Chaucer House, where Mr Lloyd Lewis had a steel workshop. Unluckily the
flaming debris blocked access to it, and they had to wait for help from the
USAF at Weston Longville. The Bawdeswell fire team consisted of
Ambrose Frankland, Sam Muttock, Billy Hagen and Arthur Currie."
Freda Aldous (nee
“Having just read the above about the 1944
Bawdeswell plane crash, it reminded me how lucky our family was to escape.
Living
in
We had a large sycamore tree in the corner of the
garden and the plane took a big piece out of it's top. When clearing my
late mother's house we found a piece of it hanging on Mr Whybrow’s
shed wall that backed onto our garden. Dad had hung it there to
remind us of how lucky we were.
Incidentally my father Herbert George Framingham (
Dick) was a member of Bawdeswell home guard
and often laughed about how they knitted while guarding Mr Elsden's one petrol
pump.”
|
|
|
Remarkably, no civilians were
injured.
|
|
|
Both crew members died in the crash.
Pilot Officer James McLean (195130) aged 26, who was the son of William
and Alison Pringle McLean of Bents, West Lothian,
McLean is buried in Tranent new Cemetery,
This is believed to have been the
only
More details of the aircraft.
KB364 was a Mosquito B Mk.XX (Canadian version of the British B Mk.V) and was
built by DeHaviland (
On 13th August 1944 she was delivered to 608 Squadron (North Riding
Squadron), which reformed on 1st August 1944 at RAF Downham Market, as part of
8 Group's Light Night Striking Force. It is recorded as suffering
damage and being repaired on site between 29th August and 23rd October.
The above information taken from the notes of Bob
Collis,
The Mosquito aircraft was made largely from plywood
and had two powerful Merlin engines on the wings and a thick sheet of steel
armour behind the crew to protect their backs. It was used as a light bomber
and in a reconaisance role. It also made some flights over
More
about Bawdeswell