Halifax near Wass.

On the 6th of November 1942 the airmen on board this aircraft took off from Linton on Ouse at 18.20hrs. They were tasked with mine laying in the Nectarine area, to the north of the Frisian's. 67 other aircraft were to lay mines in a wide area from Lorient to the Frisian's. On board was pretty much a scratch crew, four regular crew flew with three others not usually in this settled crew. They dropped their mines in the area ordered to and made for home. On this leg they drifted slightly too far south and came in over the coast in the Hull area. With visibilty poor they became lost and flew into high ground above Wass village on the southern edge of the North Yorkshire Moors, on Byland Moor at 22.30hrs. There are two given reasons for the crash occuring, the first is the most widely quoted and is probably the truth - the pilot descended through cloud to enable the navigator gain a position but the aircraft hit high ground. Whilst this was forbidden many many losses occured for the same reason. The other reason for this loss blames rudder overbalance, a common problem with early Halifax's but there is no mention to this in the RAF's AM Form 1180 (a crash report). The only reference to this is in the book "The Pendulum and The Scythe" by Ken Marshall. The aircraft crashed into a field and then trees not far from Lund Farm. Three of the crew were killed in the crash. The pilot was reasonable lucky, he escaped with minor injuries. The bomb aimer was thrown out and into some trees nearby, in his fall he broke his leg and he suffered cuts to his face and hands. After some period of time the crew were found trying to shelter at the crash site, they were taken down to the nearest farm, Lunds Farm, and later to York Military Hospital when help arrived.

The pilot would soon return to flying duties and completed his Tour. The Bomb Aimer spent some time in hospital but returned to flying duties in time to fly his 13th Op when the pilot of DT525 did his final flight of his Tour and joined him on this flight.

The aircraft was built to contract B982938/39 by E.E.C. at Salmesbury and delivered directly to 78 Sqdn on 26th September 1942. It was written off not long after in the incident detailed above with Cat E2/FB Burnt damage on 6th November 1942.

Those who lost their lives were :

Nav - F/O Harry L Humphries RCAF, aged 29, of Indian River, Ontario, Canada. Buried Newton on Ouse, Yorkshire.

Air Gunner - Sgt Charles F (Bobby) Clark RAFVR, aged 21, of Charlton, London. Buried Newton on Ouse, Yorkshire.

Rear Gunner - F/Lt George T Turner RAFVR, aged 22, of Reading. Buried Reading.

Those who survived were:

Pilot - Sgt R G Mills RCAF; survived. (Jackie Mills)

F Eng - Sgt Robert Grey RAF, of Ashington, Northumberland; injured. Husband of Noreen Grey.

WOp - Sgt L G Masterton RAF; injured.

BA - Sgt C M Edgehill RAF; injured. (Ray Edghill)

F/Lt George Turner, photograph taken at his wedding but further details regarding his bride and the other servicemen in the photograph are not yet known. My thanks to Mr Ken Burgess, cousin of George Turner, for allowing this photograph to appear here. George (Georgie) Turner was the Squadron Gunnery Officer. On this flight he had volunteered to act as rear gunner. He was born in West Ham at the Custom House and was the eldest son of George Thomas Turner Senior and Lilian Turner (nee Scurr). The family were evacuated to Reading during the war and settled there afterwards. My thanks to Mr Ken Burgess for contacting me, George Turner was his mothers cousin.

Graves of Sgt Clark and F/O Humphries at Newton on Ouse churchyard.

I visited the area of the crash in June 2004 following directions received from Howard Newbould who had located the site some days previously. The area is grass farmland so I didn't hold much hope of finding any wreckage other than what Howard had located the week before my visit. I did however find afew small peices of perspex and tiny peices of alloy in situ.

General area of where the aircraft passed through.

Small remains gathered up and placed in relative safety.

Prior to this incident, on 15th October 1942 Sgt Masterton survived a crash landing at Linton on Ouse in Halifax BB239 which turned back from Ops. All the crew survived, the pilot being Sgt W A Williams RAF.
Sgt Mills completed his Tour and was posted to instructor duties with 1652 at Marston Moor. Later as F/O he could well have been killed on 29th December 1943 in Kenya flying Sunderland EJ140 which flew into Sangala Hill to the west of Mombasa. Certainly a man of the same initials (Robert John Mills) was killed in this incident.
F/Lt Robert Grey was sadly killed on the 13th May 1943 still serving with 78 Sqdn. Halifax JB924, which he was in, was shot down by a night-fighter over Holland. He is buried at Barradeel, Netherlands. He was 25 years old. At the time of his death he was the Squadron's Flight Engineer Officer.
Sgt Edgehill 1173753 became a PoW later in the War, being held at Camp 4B. There is a possiblity that he was also the same man who survived Whitley N1498 crash near Tomatin, Inverness on 6th January 1941. Large sections of the aircraft were recovered by The Whitley Project some years ago.

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