Luftwaffe and Allied Air Forces Discussion Forum

Gentlemen,

Find enclosed information on Claude Moore's obituary, and recollections from his wife. Hopefully, I will obtain a copy of a story appearing in a Topeka, Kansas, newspaper about Moore's reunion with the infantry soldier who rescued him.
Norman Malayney
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From the Topeka Capital-Journal

Claude Creath Moore, 87, Topeka, Died Sunday, 15 June 2003, at the VA Hospital. He was born 15 March 1916 in Des Moines, Iowa. He graduated from East High School, Wichita, Kansas, and from Leland Stanford University, Palo Alta, California in in 1951 with a BA from the School of Law. He was inducted into the US Army on 24 February 1941, at Camp Robinson, Arkansas. He transferred to the Army Air Corps Navigation School at Hondo, Texas, in July of 1943, where he became a Cadet Colonel. He shipped to England in April 1944 serving with the 25th Bomb Group in the 8th Air force. He became a navigator on the RAF de Havilland Mosquito flying missions in the air offensive in the Normandy, Central Europe, Rhineland and the Northern France campaigns. Mr. Moore was wounded in action on 9 April 1945 in Germany.

He Returned to the States in July 1945 and married Betty Jan Mueller on 30 July 1945. Mr. Moore was in the investment and securities business for fifty years, managing offices of Walston, Bache & Co, Thompson McKinnon, AG Edwards and others. He was active in the State Democratic Party and served as Securities commissioner under Gov. George Docking. He was active as a civilian liaison for the Kansas Air National Guard. Interment will be at Fort Leavenworth National Cemetery with the 190th Air Refueling Wing of the Kansas Air National Guard providing military serves. He is survived by his wife, Betty, by two daughters, four grandchildren and two great grandchildren.

According to Mrs. Moore: “Years later we were to meet Nelson Griffen, the infantry sergeant who rescued Claude. Nelson filled in many of the details during an emotional reunion. Griffen and his 103rd Infantry Division squad was routing out German SS east of Heidelberg when they observed the aerial ambush and the parachuting airman. Their search resulted in the transport of the wounded Lt. Moore to an emergency medical station from where Claude was moved to a hospital in Reims, France. A trip to the area forty years later failed to find that first medical station, a converted farm house. Claude remembered being passed through a window on a stretcher.

“With the War behind us, but not forgotten, Claude entered Standford University under the GI bill and graduated with a Law Degree.

“We loved to travel and returned to Europe many times. On one trip we researched Claude's Scottish ancestry, especially the history of the Creath Clan, from whom he received his middle name. We discovered that the ancestral home of the Clan is Sterling Castle. We also visited my ancestral city of Fulda, fifty miles east of Frankfurt, Germany, and learned that one of my great grandfathers had been a Captain in the German Navy.”