Portal to the past: Memorabilia and Remembrance

10/09/26 –Portal to the past: Memorabilia and Remembrance – David Middleton

David from the Bottesford Community Heritage Group presented his talk, focussing on an Allied prison of war identity tag to reveal who it belonged to and the experiences of that war time experience and post war life. Flight Sergeant Bernard Haines was a young Australian Rear Air Gunner with 514 squadron.  Lancaster JI-C only flew two missions.  On its second mission it was shot down over Belgium.  Only two of the crew survived. Revealing the story of service, loss and survival associated with the identity tag was presented as a form of remembrance and commemoration. David wished to acknowledge Judith and Gordon Wells in making available the identity tag and Rene Romaineville for his generosity in sharing his meticulous research into the loss of Lancaster JI-C on the 18^th November 1943 near d’Assesse, Belgium

Mike W did the Vote of Thanks saying that this was close to his heart as he lost his father in a plane crash in 1942, another 55000 who died in bomber command.  This talk coincided with a book that Mike had been reading and finished that morning about letters written by servicemen during WW2. Apparently, David has another talk about a WW1 flyer and Mike requested he return at some point to tell us about it.. He thanked David for his wonderful talk and asked the members to join him in a warm round of applause. 

The picture is acreddited to  '© Rene Romainville”      AR