The crew. Marcel is standing on the right. (picture courtesy
of Jane Skelton)
The crew had
some close calls in the missions it was to
fly. One such narrow escape happened in the
night of 23/24 May 1943, on a mission to
Dortmund. 826 planes were sent out of which
38 did not return. The mid upper gunner, F/S
Eddie White, wrote his parents about this
mission:
"About a week ago it was tough going and we
shook hands with death for about 20 minutes.
Just before take off our plane gave up on us
and we had to take another. Finally we
reached target and dropped our bombs. On the
way back we were caught by search lights. We
were the only plane in the vicinity. They
fired at us with all the guns they had and
all we could do was zigzag our way out. All
the time we could hear the flak hit our
aircraft. We were in that hell for about ten
minutes, which seemed like a lifetime.
Thanks to the ability of our skipper -he was
magnificent- and the mercy of God we were
able to shake the searchlights. Although we
were all shook up, only the navigator was
hit by a piece of shrapnel. We took care of
his wound. He kept going and brought us back
home. He was a strong and brave fellow as he
had lost quite some blood.
When we passed the coast we were again
caught by searchlights. I called on the
skipper to corkscrew the plane, so I could
fire at the searchlight. Believe it or not,
I got it. You could see it explode! The
others cut their lights. Were we happy!
When we approached base we radioed we had a
wounded navigator onboard. A whole group of
brass was there when we landed. We had
already been posted as missing. When they
looked over our plane they couldn't
understand how we had survived. The plane
was heavily damaged. The nose looked like
someone on a motorbike had run it off. One
hole was so big I could stick my head
through it. One shell had entered the plane
on one side, exited on the other and
exploded about 2000 feet above us. We
counted about 20 large holes. All the
instruments of the flight engineer were shot
away. But I will no longer concern you with
this narrow escape. When time comes, in a
distant future, I will be able to tell you
all about it, because I can't write
everything in a letter."
Since than night they flew a number of
missions. The mission on the 25th of July
was their 17th mission.
In the night
of 25/26 July 1943 F/O Tomczak and his
crew took off in Halifax HR864 LQ-'M for
Mother' to bomb the industrial city of
Essen. Just after they had passed the Dutch
coast HR864 LQ-M was attacked by a German
night fighter. The tail gunner, Sgt Smyth,
saw the plane, which he could only identify
as a twin engined plane, at about 250 meter
dead astern. When the fighter attacked, Sgt
Smyth fired back and the pilot took evasive
action. When the fighter had closed in at
about 150 meters, he disengaged and came
around for a second time. This time two
engines of the Halifax were hit and set
ablaze. The plane was doomed and the pilot
ordered the crew to bail out.
The plane crashed on the land of farmer
Oudman, at the Bovenrijgerweg, just west of
Ten Boer. Soon air wardens and military
police from Ten Boer were at the site. Some
paramilitary personnel were also on the
scene very soon as was a local doctor.
"When we turned around to see from where the
smoke rose" a man called Van der Wees
reported later, "we saw a flier, who was
busy burning his papers. We walked towards
him and he came to us with his hands in the
air. The man appeared to have bruised his
left ankle. He was treated by the doctor.
After the doctor took care of him, he lit a
cigarette and managed to speak a few words
with us. First he asked if he was in
Holland. We confirmed this and told him he
was in good hands. Because the presence of
several police officers we didn't know, it
wasn't possible to talk with him a lot. I
tried quickly to explain the situation to
him: "Take care, police! No Good!" He told
us he was Canadian and had been in England
for quite a while. He turned out to be an
officer, dressed in a gray-green overall,
with on his left breast pocket some wings
with the Letter "B".
In the meantime several German soldiers had
arrived from the town of Bedum. One of them
asked if the crew of the plane had been
found. We told him that one of them was
treated by the doctor and that he was in the
doctor's car. The German went to the car but
was unsuccessful in getting the Canadian to
say much. When he was asked if he spoke
German, he answered : "A few words only".
Then the son of the doctor, named Wietse,
was told to take the flier and some German
soldiers to Bedum and from there to
Groningen, so he could be treated in a
hospital."
All of the crew died in
the crash,
except F/O Sochowski, who bailed out in time
and became a PoW. He survived
the war, returned to Canada and married. He
told his family that their plane was shot
down while it was flying low. He managed to
escape through the escape hatch in the nose
of the Halifax. He died of an heart attack
in 1961.
The crew's early grave in Ten Boer.
F/O Marcel
Tomczak is buried in Ten Boer Protestant
Cemetery, grave 26. He was 23.
(picture
courtesy of Mrs. Anne Tomczak, via Ab Jansen
in Gevleugeld Verleden)
(Picture by
Wim Bastiaanse)
