LEST WE FORGET
Flight Sergeant Ronald Rhodes KELLEY
Service No: 426613
Born: Brisbane QLD, 8 February 1923
Enlisted in the RAAF: 18 July 1942
Unit: No. 156 Squadron (RAF), RAF Station Warboys
Died: Air Operations: (No. 156 Squadron Lancaster aircraft ND446), Germany, 2 March 1944, Aged 21 Years
Buried: Durnbach War Cemetery, Bad Tolz, Bayern, Germany
CWGC Additional Information: Son of Jack Arthur and Bertha Frances Kelley, of Northgate, Queensland, Australia
Roll of Honour: Brisbane QLD
Remembered: Panel 125, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
At 2357 hours on the night of 1 March 1944 Lancaster ND446 took off from Warboys detailed to bomb Stuttgart, Germany. Nothing was heard from the aircraft after take-off and it failed to return to base. The aircraft was shot down by a night fighter and crashed at Hausen-en-Killetal some
24 kms south of Tubingen and all the crew members were killed.
The crew members of ND446 were:
Flight Sergeant Robert Minton Baker (413939) (Pilot)
Sergeant Donald Edward Barton (1814488) (RAFVR) (Flight Engineer)
Flying Officer Francis George Gains (138128) (RAFVR) (Air Bomber)
Flight Sergeant Phillip George Gotto (410655) (Navigator)
Sergeant William James Hill (1084513) (RAFVR) (Wireless Air Gunner)
Flight Sergeant Ronald Rhodes Kelley (426613) (Rear Gunner)
Sergeant Ernest Kenyon (642691) (RAF) (Mid Upper Gunner)
References:
Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour On-Line Records (RAAF Casualty Information compiled by Alan Storr (409804))
Commonwealth War Graves Commission On-Line Records
Department of Veterans’ Affairs On-Line WWII Nominal Roll
National Archives of Australia On-Line Record A705, 166/22/203