LEST WE FORGET

Flying Officer Evan Seaforth MacKENZIE

Service No: 403146
Born: Guyra NSW, 8 September 1918
Enlisted in the RAAF: 9 December 1940
Unit: No. 156 Squadron (RAF), RAF Station Warboys, Cambridgeshire
Died: Air Operations: (No. 156 Squadron Lancaster aircraft ED837), Germany, 13 May 1943, Aged 24 Years
Buried: Reichswald Forest War Cemetery, Kleve, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
CWGC Additional Information: Son of Herbert Swinton Mackenzie and Mary Muriel Mackenzie, of Llangothlin, New South Wales, Australia
Roll of Honour: Unknown
Remembered: Panel 126, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
Remembered: Guyra District Honour Roll 1939-1945, Guyra NSW
Remembered: Remembrance Driveway Memorial Plantation, Yagoona NSW

Lancaster ED837 took off from RAF Warboys at 0021 hours on the night of 12/13th May 1943, detailed to bomb Duisberg, Germany. Nothing was heard from the aircraft after take off and it failed to return to base. Six of the crew members were killed and one became a Prisoner of War.

The crew member of ED837:

Sergeant Clarence Askam (936478) (RAFVR) (Flight Engineer)
Flight Sergeant Alexander Clive Johnston (404684) (Rear Gunner)
Flying Officer Evan Seaforth MacKenzie (403146) (Navigator)
Flight Sergeant Neville Ray Mason (404987) (Air Bomber)
Pilot Officer William Murray Wendon (403389) (Pilot)
Sergeant Gordon Alexander Williams (411082) (Wireless Operator Air Gunner) PoW, Discharged from the RAAF: 12 November 1945
Flight Sergeant Ronald Gordon Wynn (408605) (Mid Upper Gunner)

In a report by the then Warrant Officer Williams he reported: “A collision was the cause of damage to the aircraft. From the time of the collision, I heard nothing from any other member of the crew, but apparently no other member was able to bale out. I baled out at 500 feet. The aircraft was not in control but there was no fire. The aircraft crashed on the outskirts of Duisberg. I was arrested by the German police after five days of walking.”

From the available records given in Chorley, it is not possible to identify the other aircraft in the collision as an allied aircraft.

Pilot Officer Wendon, and Sergeants Askam, Johnston, Williams and Wynn survived the loss of No. 460 Squadron Lancaster aircraft W4816 (Sergeant Dudley Anstruther Corfe (411124) (Bomb Aimer)) on 18 January 1943.

References:

Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour On-Line Records (RAAF Casualty Information compiled by Alan Storr (409804))
Chorley, W .R. Royal Air Force Bomber Command Losses of the Second World War – Volume 4 Aircraft and Aircrew Losses 1943, Midland Counties Publications, 1996
Commonwealth War Graves Commission On-Line Records
Department of Veteran’s Affairs On-Line WWII Nominal Roll
National Archives of Australia On-Line Record A705, 166/26/124
Register of War Memorials in New South Wales On-Line

Book Now Book Now