Archive Report: Allied Forces

Compiled from official National Archive and Service sources, contemporary press reports, personal logbooks, diaries and correspondence, reference books, other sources, and interviews.

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03/04.10.1943 No. 196 Squadron Stirling III EF464 ZO-P Fl/Sgt. G.S. Kogel

Operation: Kassel

Date: 03/04th October 1943 (Sunday/Monday)

Unit: No. 196 Squadron

Type: Stirling III

Serial: EF464

Code: ZO-P

Base: RAF Witchford, Cambridgeshire

Location: Scottow, Norfolk

Pilot: Fl/Sgt. G.S. Kogel RAFVR Safe - Injured

Fl/Eng: Sgt. Thomas Lynas Dickie 1544971 RAFVR Age 22. Killed

Nav: Sgt. C.D. Williams RAFVR Safe - Severely Injured (1)

Air/Bmr: Sgt A.W. Clarke RAFVR Safe - Injured

W/Op/Air/Gnr: Sgt. B.L. George RAFVR Safe - Injured

Air/Gnr: Sgt. J.A. Beattie RAFVR Safe - Injured

Air/Gnr: Sgt. F. Reeves RAFVR Safe - Injured

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We welcome any relatives of the crew to contact us in order to provide further information and perhaps photographs?

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REASON FOR LOSS:

Taking off from RAF Witchford, Cambridgeshire at 18.56 hrs to bomb the city of Kassel - some 547 aircraft on the operation made up from 223 Halifaxes, 204 Lancasters, 113 Stirlings with 7 Mosquitoes.

The bombing was poor due to the marker aircraft overshooting the aiming point and the ground was covered in a thick haze preventing further accurate visual markers. The Germans it is understood, also used decoy markers.

It seems that Stirling EF464 was attacked by a night fighter resulting in engine damage. The pilot returned and tried to make a landing at RAF Coltishall but before they reached the field the Port engine packed up. The aircraft crash landed on fields in Scottow Norfolk at 21.43 hrs. Sadly the flight Engineer, Sgt. Thomas Dickie, was killed in the crash landing.

(1) Sgt. Williams recovered and later served with 514 Squadron. Awarded the DFM on the 8th September 1944.

Burial details:

Sgt. Thomas Lynas Dickie. Knockbreda Cemetery, Belfast. Sec. K. Grave 198. Son of Robert and Edith Williams Dickie, of Belfast, Northern Ireland. His grave inscription chosen by his family, reads: “He died that we might live.”

For further details our thanks to the following, Bill Chorley - 'Bomber Command Losses Vol's. 1-9, plus ongoing revisions', ‘Bomber Command Database’, Dr. Theo E.W. Boiten and Mr. Roderick J. Mackenzie - 'Nightfighter War Diaries Vol's. 1 and  2', Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everitt - 'Bomber Command War Diaries (Updated 2014 version), Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

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