Recovery of bodies in WW2 (possibly not for the sqeamish?)

a link to another forum detailing the recovery of a hurricane and its pilot from a bog in russia, not for the sqeamish or faint of heart

http://warrelics.eu/forum/armour-weapons-aircraft/hurricane-wreck-pilot-recovery-northern-russia-514/

i hope this doesnt offened anyone or break any forum rules its not ment to

Rip all who died

regards Sam

Ahh…….highly recommended 🙂

The book by Stuart Haddaway “Missing Believed Killed” (Pen & Sword) is a must-read if you are looking into this subject.

Incidentally, the RCAF veteran is still alive and flying! but he did tell me that his wingman’s sister had turned up to the funeral. She was a nurse and asked him ‘so how much of what’s in that coffin is my brother and how much is bricks and sand?’

interesting topic, I also understood it to be 7lbs…I also understand that the RAF frequently referred to the those who had this awful task as ‘Sid Walkers Gang’ (rag and bone men of the time)

I also spoke to an RCAF veteran, his colleague had dived in (Spitfire) from a great height and exploded on impact (AM cites failure of Oxygen supply meaning that at least the poor bu**er had passed out) he drove to the scene after landing as they had been on a routine training flight, it was only some ten minutes from the base. He said that the recovery crew were already there, and some women from the farm where the plane had crashed.
He said that one of the recovery crew had approached the youngest girl* and held his hand out and said ‘that’s what death smells like’ he’d said to her and she was then sick. The RCAF chap had then threatened to pummel him into the ground, but the Cpl had said ‘this is how we do things, we have to have a laugh or we’d go mad’
I talk frequently to a chap who did this from 1943 onwards, he’s incredibly interesting. Said that for years he was ashamed to admit what he did in the RAF and told people that he was ground crew.

*Sad tale, but true-the young lass who had been sick was unfortunate enough to then witness the crash of a liberator some years later, she ran out of the house and through the wreckage, which had spread a long way..she stepped onto something and then realised that it was a torso. She became very ill almost overnight and although only very young, she died about a year later. Her sister told me that it was the effects of shock. Her hair went grey in the space of a few weeks.

I’ve been investigating those marked LMF and if anyone is in Matlock you will see a group of very expensive houses up on the highest point of town, one of these was a home for those men. I interviewed a nurse from there some years ago but she would tell me very little. I feel so sorry for those men who had already done ops but just couldn’t face any more.

On an equally ‘touchy’ subject, what happened to those that suffered LMF?

The RAF, at least, maintained disciplinary or punishment camps where many such cases were sent along with others sentenced by courts martial. Generally these maintained harsh “bull” and manual work regimes with the men there effectively under open arrest. One such camp was at Sheffield. I believe that these camps were for cases thought to have a chance of recovery (!) whereas others not deemed so would be dismissed the service and could be sent(?) to work in the mines or to the army. If LMF cases managed to survive the punishment camps, they could be remustered in the RAF though their file would note the LMF status so getting back to flying status was unlikely, even if the man desired it.

Not the finest part in the history of our armed services.

On an equally ‘touchy’ subject, what happened to those that suffered LMF?

I imagine that they were removed from the Squadron/Regiment/Ship but where too?

I seem to remember reading many many years ago that possibly an airman was declared LMF but then latter served in combat with the Army or possibly in bomb disposal, any truth to this?

Sorry, I don’t mean to kidnap the post but felt it better to raise this topic within this post, rather than open another, unless others feel differently!

Would recovery of insufficient remains lead to two crew members being interred in the same plot then? I ask because the Lanc crew a relative of mine was on all have separate graves, apart from the tail gunner and the pilot share the same plot.

I would suggest that in that case there was sufficient evidence to identify the other five members of the crew individually, the remains of the other two providing too much evidence for one body (three arms for instance) but not enough to identify them individually.

Regards,

kev35

Similarly, a German crew from a crash I was interested in are buried under a single stone at Cannock Chase. Having seen what the sea was bringing out of the upcast in the early ’90s, and considering what happened (dived in from low level, burst into flames, parts of bomb load exploded, fire only put out by incoming tide) frankly I think it says a great deal for the unfortunate* bucket squad that they found enough to name four men.

* who had to live with what they’d seen afterwards. The crew had no such worries…

Adrian

Would recovery of insufficient remains lead to two crew members being interred in the same plot then? I ask because the Lanc crew a relative of mine was on all have separate graves, apart from the tail gunner and the pilot share the same plot.

Maybe a bit different: My mothers cousin, a Lancaster pilot, was killed with his crew and three French civilians: the aircraft crashed onto a farm house. All are buried in ‘collective’ graves numbering 1 to 10 but each has a headstone of their own.

Couple of thoughts on various postings above;

With regards to the rules for the US armed forces I was with a 101st Airborne vet while he was visiting the scene of one of his toughest battles where he had lost many friends, he mentioned that he didnt know what had been buried for two of them as there was little or nothing left after a direct hit from an artillery round…

I have also visited many Commonwealth aircrew graves in Europe and there are unfortunately quite a few where you have up to 7 headstones tight against each other as i presume that the remains could not be identified seperately.

Would recovery of insufficient remains lead to two crew members being interred in the same plot then?

It did happen. The remains of Guy Gibson and his navigator, Squadron Leader James B. Warwick DFC, were buried in one coffin as the remains recovered from the crash were reportedly a foot, a hand and some scraps of hair and scalp. The navigator was apparently identified from a laundry tag and with the lack of other remains it was assumed that the pilot had got out and so the grave was marked only with Warwick’s name. It was only later that it became apparent that Gibson had also been killed and of course there was no way of telling if the remains were those of one or both men so the coffin was left as it was but a headstone for Gibson was also erected.

I’ve often wondered exactly how much ended up in coffins after an air crash, where there might be collosal forces involved, through impact, explosion, and fire….

Allow me to quote from the excellent Daughter of the Air: The Brief Soaring Life of Cornelia Fort by Rob Simbeck, Published by Atlantic Monthly Press, 1999.*

“….a fourteen-year-old from a nearby farm, saw scalp and hair in a tree not far from the plane — Cornelia’s body had essentially exploded on impact…”
Another neighbor “…found an insignia pin and a piece of Corneli’s watch which had been smashed flat. There were only 60 pounds of remains that could be collected to be shipped to Nashville. Cornelia had weighed 140 pounds.” Emphasis added.

And from my own time in the service as a member of the base’s Diaster Control Group, I saw the remains of a Phantom crew (from another unit) which crashed near our base. There was not much left. Those images will be with me forever.

*Cornelia Fort was a wealthy Nashville socialite turned WAFS…the Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Service…pilot who perished while ferrying a BT-13 in a midair collision with another BT-13 in 1943. That August, the WAFS would become better known as the WASPs. She was the first American woman pilot to die while in military service.
She had gained some fame as being the flight instructor in the air with a student when Japanese forces attacked Pearl Harbour in 1941.
That scene is recreated in the film Tora, Tora, Tora.

A memorial was placed at the crash site, in a remote canyon west of Dyess Air Force Base, in 2000. A Dyess B-1, with an female crew, performed a flyover.

Well before DNA analysis, I don’t suppose they even tested remains for blood type during WW2, so they would have no idea who was who when they cleared up after a bad crash. Flying accidents were very commonplace back then, especially at training units using old war-weary aircraft, and there was still a war to be won, so actually discerning individual victims probably wasn’t a very high priority.
The relations would have never known the difference…

Would recovery of insufficient remains lead to two crew members being interred in the same plot then? I ask because the Lanc crew a relative of mine was on all have separate graves, apart from the tail gunner and the pilot share the same plot.

I’ve often wondered exactly how much ended up in coffins after an air crash, where there might be collosal forces involved, through impact, explosion, and fire. Relatives of mine, who used to live near RAF Dallachy during the war, told me that bricks were often used to add some weight to the coffins.
Anyone who has visited a wreck site will appreciate that the human body is so much more frangible than the many thousands of small pieces of alloy, steel, perspex etc, which are left lying around.
I remember reading years ago of the recovery of a WW2 German aircraft (maybe a Me110?), which had crashed vertically from many thousands of feet, and even the ammunition boxes well outboard on the wings were stuffed full of human remains…

Body Recovery

I interviewed a man about a 61 OTU Spitfire crash in Surrey where he (as a boy) watched as they lifted “bloody lumps of meat” out of the cockpit and placed them in the pilots parachute.

Nick,

Do you know if the cause of DT578’s accident was ever determined? Looking at the terrain and the surface weather chart (albeit the Historic charts at http://theweatheroutlook.com/twodata/dathistcharts.aspx ) it seems as though rotor flow or marked mountain wave flow could have been a significant facto. (Although I’d need to do some more digging to determine the actual wind flow aloft.)

Brian

Bird Dog.
Having spoken to the relatives of a Lancaster that crashed nearby, they were all aware that the majority of the weight in their loved ones coffins was sand. The remains of the Lanc that crashed, along with the substantial remains of the crew was bulldozed and covered over very quickly as the crash impacted a busy important road, which needed to be reopened asap. Newspaper reports of the time stated that police officers had the task of collecting the remains, which had been ejected from the immediate vicinity of the impact. The families who I took to the site were aware that their loved ones were still there, and wished it to be looked upon as a war grave.

I highly recommend Stuart Hadaways book ” Missing Believed Killed”. Amazing read on the MRES units who had the job of recovering 55,000 missing airmen right after the war. I had the pleasure of knowing one of these gentlemen, my old neighbour RCAF F/L Angus Dixon, his widow let me look through his MRES notes and I have a great respect for these units and men who had to do that job, not for the faint of heart. Stuart goes on to say how Guy Gibson was identified by his name on his Battledress! Around 10,000 of these airman are still missing, a must read, cheers Darrell