LEST WE FORGET
Flying Officer Cecil Alexander McPHERSON
Service No: 413321
Born: Narrandera NSW, 30 July 1918
Enlisted in the RAAF: 16 August 1941
Unit: No. 2 (Coastal) Operational Training Unit (RAF), RAF Station Catfoss
Died: Aircraft Accident (No. 2 (Coastal) Operational Training Unit Beaufighter aircraft JL432), North Sea, 10 February 1944, Aged 25 Years
Buried: Unrecovered
CWGC Additional Information: Son of John and Josephine McPherson; husband of Ethel Lucy McPherson, of Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, Australia
Roll of Honour: Unknown
Remembered: Panel 257, Runnymede Memorial, Surrey UK
Remembered: Panel 126, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
Remembered: Victory Memorial Gardens Cenotaph, Wagga Wagga NSW
In the early hours of the morning of 10 February 1944 Beaufighter JL432 took off from RAF Station Catfoss on a cross country non-operational training flight. The weather was satisfactory. Regular wireless signals were received up to 0445 hours that everything was going as planned. The aircraft then should have been on the west coast leg of the flight between Northallerton and Filey. After this nothing further was heard from the aircraft. Searches by aircraft during the day were unsuccessful. Later that day the Coast Guard reported that part of an aircraft was washed ashore, and it was positively identified as part of the missing JL432. Flying Officer Lipscomb’s body was washed ashore at Withernsea but the remains of Flying Officer McPherson were not recovered and in 1949 it was recorded that he was lost at sea.
The crew members of JL432 were:
Flying Officer Edwin Jack Lipscomb (151683) (RAFVR) (Navigator)
Flying Officer Cecil Alexander McPherson (413321) (Pilot)
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, 166/26/369
Register of War Memorials in New South Wales On-Line