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Re: Tempest Loss 222 Sqn 29/04/1945 Puzzle?
Hello,
Spitfire Vb BL619 was a presentation aircraft:
STIRLING ROCK.
Presented by the Stirling Spitfire Fund, Scotland, with a donation of 5,000 pound. Mk.Vb BL619 was taken on charge at No.38 MU, Llandow on 9 January 1943 [sic], and joined No.222 (Natal) Sqn on 28 February, coded ZD-S, for sweeps and bomber escort duties from North Weald. On 30 April, during Circus 147, a sweep to Abbeville, the aircraft was damaged by Bf 109s of JG 26 and belly-landed in a field near Abbeville. Sgt Leslie Gordon Rowe 1198670 aged 32 from Upminster, Essex, was taken prisoner, but subsequently died in the German Red Cross Hospital at Ratzeburg on 29 April 1945 and was buried in Section 5, Row D, Grave 3, Kiel War Cemetery.
See:Gifts of War/Boot & Sturtivant. p.300
A Photo of BL619 "STIRLING ROCK", appeared in the 1st English edition of Gunther Bloemertz's, Heaven Next Stop (between pp.64-5), back in 1953!
Col.
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