Operation: Cologne, Germany

Date: 17/18th April 1941 (Thursday/Friday)

Unit: No. 149 Squadron

Type: Wellington IC

Serial: P9248

Code: OJ-G

Base: RAF Mildenhall, Suffolk

Location: Unknown - lost without trace

Pilot: Sgt. Jack Peel 1272896 RAFVR Age 25. Killed

Pilot 2: Sgt. Talbot Charles Cyril Clifton 906677 RAFVR Age 29. Missing - believed killed

Nav: P/O. Kenneth Ernest Platt 60781 RAFVR Age ? Missing - believed killed

W/Op/Air/Gnr: Sgt. Edward Ernest Allnatt 909911 RAFVR Age 23. Missing - believed killed

W/Op/Air/Gnr: Sgt. Harry Spencer Walters 946880 RAFVR Age 21. Missing - believed killed

Air/Gnr: Sgt. John Wood 906925 RAFVR Age 27. Missing - believed killed

REASON FOR LOSS:

Took off at 00:55hrs from Mildenhall, Suffolk to bomb the city of Cologne.

A total force of 10 Wellingtons took part in this operation and 2 were lost.

The other from 9 Squadron:

N2745 WS-O flown by Sgt. Gordon Ernest Heaysman 754459 RAFVR who was killed along with his observer Sgt. Grant John Mavor R/56873 RCAF the other 4 crew members of this Wellington were taken as PoW.

No further details of the loss of P9248 - no night fighter claims are attributed to it.

Above left - right : Sgt. Jack Peel, P/O. Kenneth Ernest Platt, Sgt. John Wood on left and another unidentified chap described as "Joe from another crew" (Courtesy Richard and Julian Allnatt and Cath Rhodes)

Burial details:

Sgt. Jack Peel. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 50. Son of Walter and Grace Peel, of Lincoln, England. Sgt. Jack Peel. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 50. Son of Walter and Grace Peel, of Lincoln, England. Further information added by Cath Rhodes: Jack was the youngest brother of my great grandfather, Redvers Robert Peel who joined up in WW1, under age as he was born 1900 but served first in the Lincolnshire Yeomanry then Machine Gun Corps. Survived, and then served in WW2 in the Raf on the ground. His oldest brother W.S. PEEL (known as Sidney as his full name was Walter Sidney, but avoided confusion with his father by using second name) won a military medal in WW1, and was an early member of the Royal Flying Corps, being shot down in France in September 1918.

Sgt. Talbot Charles Cyril Clifton. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 41. Son of Talbot and Clara Edith Elizabeth Clifton, of Bromley, Kent, husband of Dorothy Clifton, of Eltham, London, England.

P/O. Kenneth Ernest Platt. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 34. N.o.K details currently not available.

Sgt. Edward Ernest Allnatt. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 38. Son of Richard Ernest and Alice Maud Allnatt, of Swindon, Wiltshire, England.

Sgt. Harry Spencer Walters. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 54. Son of Ellen Walters, of Lower Hartshay, Derbyshire, England.

Sgt. John Wood. None - commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 55. Son of John Arthur and Mary Ann Wood, husband of Ivy Joan Wood, of Wickford, Essex, England.

Researched for Mr. and Mrs. William Bent from Beccles, Suffolk, England. Mrs. Bent is the niece of P/O. Kenneth Ernest Platt. Also to Cath Rhodes who contacted us in May 2017 with photo and information on Sgt. Jack Peel. With thanks to the following: Bill Chorley - "Bomber Command Losses", Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everitt "Bomber Command War Diaries", the C.W.G.C.. Further information on 149 Squadron is available in a publication "Strong by Night" by John Johnson and Nick Carter - published by Air Britain Historians Ltd in December 2002. ISBN No: 978-0851303130