Pilot, 2nd Lieutenant Robert L Wells USA

[noggin]

Has anybody info on the above pilot and incident, the only details I can find is his aircraft crashed at Thorpe Nottinghamshire 16 March 1944. " The pilot, 2nd Lieutenant Robert L Wells, was seriously injured and taken to a military hospital. He recovered sufficiently to tell the subsequent inquest that everything appeared to be in order on his test flight – until “all of a sudden, it developed engine trouble and swerved violently. It went into a spin and then went into a vertical dive. Bits started to fly off the machine. I got ready to make a parachute jump and was pulled out by the suction. It was like a whirlpool.”
The coroner, J B Norman, said: “It is quite clear the machine developed some mechanical defect. The pilot did his utmost to right the plane and stayed in it longer than he should have done. I find therefore that the death of Mr George Stansall was due to heart failure due to shock caused by extensive burns sustained when the plane crashed into the house. It was Death by Misadventure.” George is not recorded as a civilian casualty by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission."

[Snautzer]

440316 P-38J 42-68019 77FS 20FG 367 8 BOEF 5 Wells, Robert L ENG Thorpe Village, Newark (BOEF Bailed Out-Engine Failure)

http://www.aviationarchaeology.com/s...y/Mar1944O.htm

[noggin]

Thank you very much

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Originally Posted by noggin

Has anybody info on the above pilot and incident, the only details I can find is his aircraft crashed at Thorpe Nottinghamshire 16 March 1944. " The pilot, 2nd Lieutenant Robert L Wells, was seriously injured and taken to a military hospital. He recovered sufficiently to tell the subsequent inquest that everything appeared to be in order on his test flight – until “all of a sudden, it developed engine trouble and swerved violently. It went into a spin and then went into a vertical dive. Bits started to fly off the machine. I got ready to make a parachute jump and was pulled out by the suction. It was like a whirlpool.”
The coroner, J B Norman, said: “It is quite clear the machine developed some mechanical defect. The pilot did his utmost to right the plane and stayed in it longer than he should have done. I find therefore that the death of Mr George Stansall was due to heart failure due to shock caused by extensive burns sustained when the plane crashed into the house. It was Death by Misadventure.” George is not recorded as a civilian casualty by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission."

From my past searches, the CWGC will only list civilians killed by crashes of enemy aircraft. If they were killed by Allied aircraft, they were apprently not considered as war victims. But it is only from some cases, I don't know if this is a rule applying to all cases.

[Col Bruggy]

Hello,

"From my past searches, the CWGC will only list civilians killed by crashes of enemy aircraft. If they were killed by Allied aircraft, they were apparently not considered as war victims. But it is only from some cases, I don't know if this is a rule applying to all cases."

Generally speaking, where known, civilians were named, eg.

10 February 1944.
38thFS/55thFG.
P-38J 42-67667

While on a ferry flight to Duxford, from 84th FS/78thFG, struck British field vehicle killing the driver, Harry Benjamin BRADLEY (civilian).

2ndLt Robert N GORE USAAF - Survived.

Bradley - http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/3100436/

P-38J 42-67667 - http://www.americanairmuseum.com/aircraft/19904

Another example:

15 September 1944
552ndFTS/495thFTG
P-47C 41-6178

Crashed near Leicester, pilot and civilian were killed.

Lt Herbert C BELFORD USAAF +

Civilian - Elizabeth Ellen JACKSON + (74) - http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/3121885/

P-47C 41-6178 - http://www.americanairmuseum.com/aircraft/20715

Col.

[dp_burke]

My web host is down today but I linked up a list from CWGC found on ancestry.com
http://www.rafcommands.com/forum/sho...shing-aircraft

[noggin]

Thank you all. The other local ( to me ) fatalities , the Brumpton children 6 in total killed by a crashing Hampden in 41 were not listed by the CWGC either. Thier communal grave was funded in main by the local community at the time.

[Col Bruggy]

Hello,

You will find the Brumpton children, here: http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead.aspx?cpage=1

Col.

[noggin]

Yes , sorry I meant they didn't recieve a CWGC burial

[dp_burke]

Civilians on CWGC are all recorded as war dead and you will see that all civilians are recorded by registration district. It was never intended that civilians would have CWGC burials. It is jyst that they are recorded.

Bear in mind that many service personnel who died in The UK or Ireland could be returned to their family for burial and those are buried in family plots with family headstones. Some such burials coukd not be accounted for at the wars end and so you would find service people recorded on screen wall memorials.