""The flight was to be our last training bombing run. Due to cloud we were unable to see our target. Desiring to complete our training that night, 'Mac' (Macgrath) our pilot, asked 'Bill' (Edwards) the navigator the height of mountains in the area. Bill checked and informed Mac 1100 feet, safe to descend to 2000 feet which the pilot gradually did. When at 2000 ft we hit the mountain, Mac called "Crash Positions". We ran approx a mile along the top, leaped over the valley and hit another mountain top. Next thing I knew I was lying in a pool of petrol which was coming down from the tank in the wing. I had obviously been unconcious.

The plane had split roughly across the middle. I had been thrown out (fracturing a vertabrae I found out later in hospital). I crawled around the front of the plane, heard someone moaning, crawled further around and found the wireless operator 'Rip' D.M.Lee, the engineer 'Pete' H.Reynolds and the navigator 'Bill' (Edwards) lying one on top of the other. I then dragged them clear of the petrol - only Bill was alive.

I then crawled to the rear part of the plane where the rear gunner 'Tug' (Wilson) was still trapped. I could not reach him because of my injury, but stayed nearby talking to reasure him, saying I was sure someone would come. The 'someone' who arrived was the farmer over whose home we had flown, (unfortunately pouring petrol over his property). He informed me that he had telephoned the fire brigade. This farmer later visited me in hospital telling me that they had been unable to have a fire or cook for several days. Next to arrive was the fire brigade who checked us all, made me as comfortable as possble, released 'Tug' from his turret and checked the rest of the crew moving them further away from the aircraft out of further danger. A while later came a doctor from a Canadian squadron somewhere in the vicinity who tried to inject everyone, including the civilians. I told him "politely" to go away and leave us alone.

Whilst I was in hospital at Northallerton, I was visited by two RAF Officers regarding my version of the crash. I gave them the same description of events as given to you regarding the height of mountains and heights we could descend to. {{I sent Mr Bosley the AM1180 crash report for this incident}} I see from your copy of the official report that they concluded it was pilot error. Mac was too good a pilot to descend lower than the navigator's recommendation. It also stated that we crashed at 1050ft. This confirms the answer given by the navigator, i.e. the highest point in the area was 1100ft. I have always been convinced that the altimeter was over-reading on that night's flight.

I was hospitalised for nearly 3 weeks, when the authorities decided to clear as many patients as possible for Christmas. As my wife was staying in the area and visiting daily I was allowed home to Ebbw Vale, South Wales, on sick leave in her charge to convalesse for approx 1 month. I returned to light duties for a few months and around the middle of March was declared fit to fly again. I joined a new crew and was posted to 466 RAAF Station at Driffield, Yorks. I completed around 5 operations, then the war ended fortunately. I retrained as a Motor Mechanic, was posted to RAF Cranwell from where I was eventually demobbed in June 1946.""

In November 2007 I was again fortunate enough to be emailed by Mrs Diane DeKlerk, the grand-daughter of Norman Wilson who in turn put me in contact with her father Mr Norman Wilson (Jnr), Mr Wilson was kind enough to firstly send the painting of his father (shown above) and to be able to give further information into his fathers life and flying career. I would like to thank him for this. Norman Wilson was born on the 15th of January 1913 in Gateshead on Tyne, at the age of 14 he left school to become a coal miner and worked in mines around the Newcastle and Gateshead area. At the outbreak of War he was transferred to work in an iron ore mine near Saltburn, Yorkshire where he married and had his son also named Norman in 1940 (they later had a daughter). He joined the Saltburn Home Guard where he had some training on Lewis guns. He twice survived being buried alive in mining accidents before volunteering to join the services at the end of 1943 and after basic training opted to be an air gunner after getting the taste for machine guns with the Home Guard. He first flew on 18th February 1944 at 11 AGS at Andreas, Isle of Man in Anson LT837 with the pilot being F/Sgt Proudfoot. Following 21 flights in Ansons at this training unit and 17hrs flying he completed the course on 11th May 1944 but officially qualified as an air gunner on 28th April 1944.

His next training was with 21 OTU, "X" Flight, based at Moreton in the Marsh and he first flew in a Wellington on 15th June 1944 with the pilot being W/O Bagnall. He would then make his first flight with "Mac" McGrath here, and here he added 10hrs 40 minutes flying before being posted to "D" Flight of 21 OTU at Enstone later in June 1944. Again he first flew in a Wellington here on 27th June 1944 with F/O Gray being the pilot. His (and probably the main part of his crew) completed 56 flights from Enstone though mainly training exercises until 23rd September 1944 (although "Tug" returned to Moreton in the Marsh for parachute and dinghy training from 3rd July to 18th August) and clocked up 50 hours flying in the day and 45 hours flying at night. One of these flights was a leaflet dropping operation over Norway (with "Mac" and "Rip") on 13th August 1944 and possibly a further such flight. He was later awarded a medal from the King of Norway for making such flights.

The crew were later posted to Marston Moor and made their first flight here in a Halifax on 2nd November 1944 with F/O Knox being the pilot, probably an instructor in aircraft "GV-B" where they continued to have training exercises.

Of the events of the night of the accident Mr Wilson recalls that his fathers recollections of the incident was that they had one last night-flying exercise to do before joining an operational squadron the following week. Mac had refused two faulty planes before accepting the one which caused the crash. Here it is probably best to quote directly from Mr Wilson's email, his father was a very lucky man to survive the accident, his father thought that ""they were returning to base and the engines cut out one after the other and the plane "nose dived" into the ground, after which he lost consciousness. He said he remembered someone telling him to blow his whistle but not remembering whether he did or not, then waking up in hospital in plaster unable to move. He remembered asking about Mac & Rip and the rest of the crew, to be told they were in a different part of the hospital, but given no details. (It was much later he learned of their deaths). He was under the impression that the mid-upper gunner had walked away from the crash uninjured, had been posted to a squadron a couple of weeks later and had been shot down and killed on his 1st mission, so that he was now the sole survivor of the crew. {This was not the case however}. The injuries he sustained were to plague him for the rest of his life. When I saw him in Northallerton Hospital, he was covered from head to toe in plaster. His left arm, left leg in slings, his body, back & front in one-inch plaster cast. He had a fractured skull, his arm broken in two places such that a steel plate had to be bolted in situ. His pelvis was fractured and he had to be taught to walk again (with a limp, as one leg was now about 1/2in. shorter than the other). He had 3 broken ribs & a broken leg. I believe he was in Northallerton for about 18 months before being transferred closer home to Dunstan Hill Hospital (Gateshead). Even after his discharge he was being admitted 3-4 times per year because of pelvis problems. Until about 1948 when we moved house, he was in regular contact with both Mrs McGrath & Mrs Lee. Mrs Lee came to England to visit her boys graves"" and met up with the Wilson family. Mrs Lee brought two pieces of coral from the Great Barrier Reef which she had placed on her boys gravestones. Mr Wilson remembers seeing them there when he and his father and mother visited the graves in Harrogate in the early 1950's and again in 1986 when he visited with his wife.

Norman Wilson died in 1987.

The photograph above shows a general view of the area of where the crash occured as seen from the escarpment above. The aircraft crash site is one of the less known sites in the area and whilst including it on this website is probably not going to keep it that way, the photographs shown here do not give the location away. Some of the parts at the crash site are very rare for a Halifax site in Yorkshire and it is known that upon finding my website one local individual does visit these sites and more often than not remove these rarer parts. After many years of trying to locate the crash site John Skinn and myself finally found it in July 2008.

The photograph above shows a complete portion of cockpit windscreen, this part was located in the centre section of the front windscreen.

The photograph above shows a rare aileron mass balance. The Halifax had two of these, one on the top side of the end of each wing to stop the ailerons flapping about. Made of lead they simply do not show up at crash sites today.

The photograph above shows an instrument face found at the crash site many years ago by fellow researcher Mr Ken Reast.