Commemorating with my friends across the pond

Had  a very beautiful and interesting round of cycling yesterday. Surprising how much history there is to be found literally around the corner.

Commemorative stone for Régis Deleuze at his crash site

After 15 minutes we ran in to a stone commemorating the death of Flight Lieutenant Régis Deleuze, who crashed on this spot near castle Beverweerd in Werkhoven on February 25th 1945. Apparently engine trouble forced him to put his Tempest down. He crashed after hitting the top of the tree line in the background.

Régis came from either a French family of nobles. From his operational history is gather that he left France as is was being overrun by the Germans in June 1940 and signed up for the RAF.  In 1943 he joined 501 Squadron and brought down V1s aimed at England. He transferred to 274 Sqn early in 1945. This seems to have been  his first operational flight in the unit, from airbase Volkel in Noord-Brabant. Régis was initially burried in Werkhoven but transferred to Evere in Belgium after the war.

Régis at age 17 (from the website below)

As in the case of the grave of air gunner Hiscox I found in Beesel a few weeks ago, this stone has been adopted by a local woman, Yvonne Jager, starting when she was 10 years old. She lays fresh flowers at the grave four times a year. The lengths to which she has gone to retrace the family and former brothers in arms of this pilot are remarkable. Her story and that of Régis Deleuze can be found on this website. It shows once again that even a simple reminder can have great impact on individual lives and that many people still value the effort of allied soldiers for our freedom.

Castle Beverweerd, with 19th century fantasy decoration

The brick part at the centre of the picture is from the 13th century, with the later additions in white plaster. Apparently the castle is now inhabited by master forger, Geert Jan Jansen. He´s famous enough now to paint under his ow name. More castles on Wednesday!

A Lonely Wargrave, or not so lonely

Found last week on the cemetry of Beesel, Limburg. On the eastern bank of the Maas (or Meuse, as the French say)

The grave contains the body of  RAF air gunner, Flight Sergeant H.J. Hiscox, a New Zealander whose Lancaster crashed in July 1944 a few miles away on the way back from a bombing run on Homberg in Germany. There is a webpage in his honour.

As you can see, the grave is well looked after. One of the people we met there, preparing the cemetry for All Souls, told me a woman had been tending the grave for several decades now. Kids from the village learn of his history, also through the stories of his former comrades in arms. It is good to know that even this lone soldier is not forgotten.

This area along the Meuse was in the frontline in from Market Garden until the Allies crossed the river in early March 1945. The cemetry also contains a grave of three local victims of the war, a father, his 12 year old son and his aunt, killed by a grenade or shell (the Dutch word granaat can mean either) in November 1944.

In those last months of occupation the Germans rounded up 3,000 young men from the western bank of the Maas to work in German factories. 120 of them didn't return.

A commemorative plate on the church in Nunhem

Gomorrah in Hamburg

In the summer of 1943, RAF Bomber Command and the Eight USAAF took on the most important German port Hamburg, also a major industrial center. Over the space of a week in late July the American and British bombers alternatied day and night raids targeting industrial, but also civilian areas. It was called operation Gomorrah. I was faced with some of the remains during my trip to Hamburg last week.

Indestructible flak tower built 1942 in central Hamburg

By the RAF standards of the time, the initial raid was a success. This means that losses were light and over 40% of airplanes claimed to have dropped their load within 5 km of the target. Yes, let that last bit sink in. So the other 60%... indeed.

The low losses were due to the first time use of Window, small tin foil strips that messed up the German radar defenses so that the flak defenses were firing blind into the night sky. However, the Germans quickly recovered from the surprise and reorganised their air defenses accordingly.

Plaque commemorating the destruction of the previous
building in 1943 and the rebuilding in 1956

With the limited aiming techniques of the time, large parts of the urban area were hit, but more critically,a firestorm was caused as the heat of fires sucked in more oxygen. The fire raged for days as the exhausted fire brigades watched helplessly. This resulted in the destruction of 60 % of the city and the death of about 42,000 to 50,000 people, according to your source. Although the firestorm was unintentional, Bomber Command was impressed with the results and would later try to recreate the effect.

The success of the Hamburg raids for a few months gave the Allies the hope that they could bomb Germany out of the war, and even gave the Nazi and Luftwaffe leadership a great scare. However, the Allies didn´t pursue their advantage and the Luftwaffe quickly found counter measures and the balance swung back to favour the defenders.


The 1943 raids were not the first nor the last of the war.  Civilian morale recovered and fugitives returned. Within months most Hamburg factories were up and running again. So the RAF had to go back  By 1945 three quarters of the town had been flattened. Although as brutal as Dresden, the Hamburg bombings are not as notorious as the former, probably because they occurred with victory a distant prospect in 1943.

Canadian Museum of Flight

In January 2008 I visited the Canadian Museum of Flight in Langley, BC with my brother who then lived in Vancouver. It's a small museum, but has a nice collection with some interesting bits you won't find as easily in Europe.

I'm putting up some of the pictures, but as I'm no expert on aviation, I won't be able to dish out on details. I've provided links to the excellent website of the museum if you want to know more.

Canadian Quicky, a homebuilt design from the 1970s. It still looks cool.



Beechcraft 3NMT Expeditor, a Canadian C-45 in ample use


Canadair CT-114 Tutor. This plane was used by the Snowbirds, the RCAF demonstration team, in the 1970s



Avro Canada CF-100 Canuck, a Canadian designed and built aircraft from around 1950


Replica of SE5A