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Operation: Rhubarb
Date: 9th April 1941 (Wednesday)
Unit: No. 64 Squadron (motto: Tenax propositi - 'Firm of purpose')
Type: Spitfire Mk IIA
Serial: P7784
Code: SH-L
Base: RAF Hornchurch, Essex
Location: near Fort-Mardyck 5 km west of Dunkerque France
Pilot: P/O. John Hampton Rowden 83249 RAFVR Age 28. Killed
Update January 2023: 'Simply Spitfire' is currently building a full-size metal replica Spitfire and hoping to base it on P7784 flown by P/O John Hampton Rowden.
REASON FOR LOSS:
Attacked and shot down by a Me109 of II/JG51 flown by Hauptmann Josef Fözö (see Kracker Luftwaffe Archive on this site). The aircraft apparently came down near a flak battery within the airfield at Fort-Mardyck, creating huge interest as shown by the series of photographs.
(Some of which we have decided not to place on the page of remembrance or we have masked)
Above P/O. John Hampton Rowden with photographs below showing the wreckage (courtesy Michel Beckers)
Area of operations
P/O. John Hampton Rowden at rear 3rd from the left
P/O. John Hampton Rowden. Dunkirk Town Cemetery. Plot 2 Row 1 Grave 44. Husband of Catherine Rowden (née Finch) of Vernon Avenue, Rugby, England.
Researched by Michel Beckers, with photographs supplied by the Rowden family and Edward McManus. Kracker Archive.
Other sources as quoted in the section below.
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning we will remember
them. - Laurence
Binyon
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Last Modified: 28 January 2023, 14:09