LEST WE FORGET
Pilot Officer John Downing PYE
Service No: 404262
Born: Tamworth NSW, 4 October 1917
Enlisted in the RAAF: 19 July 1940 (at Brisbane QLD)
Unit: No. 77 Squadron (RAF), RAF Station Elvington
Died: Air Operations: (No. 77 Squadron Halifax aircraft DT796), Germany, 27 April 1943, Aged 25 Years
Buried: Reichswald Forest War Cemetery, Kleve, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
CWGC Additional Information: Son of Albert Edward and Lillian Margaret Pye; husband of Marcia Monica Pye, of Ballina, New South Wales, Australia
Roll of Honour: Ballina NSW
Remembered: Panel 129, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
Remembered: Lismore Cenotaph, Lismore NSW
At 0039 hours on the morning of 27 April 1943 Halifax DT796 took off from Elvington detailed to bomb Duisberg, Germany. Nothing was heard from the aircraft after take-off and it failed to return to base. The aircraft was hit by anti-aircraft fire and crashed on the Scheidstrasse at Essen-Haarzoph, Germany. Two of the crew members were killed and the other five became Prisoners of War.
The crew members of DT796 were:
Pilot Officer D W Atter (129046) (RAFVR) (Air Bomber) PoW
Flight Sergeant G E Barfoot (934366) (RAFVR) (Wireless Air Gunner) PoW
Sergeant P D Gibbs (1389097) (RAFVR) (Mid Upper Gunner) PoW
Pilot Officer John Downing Pye (404262) (Pilot)
Flying Officer Robert Campbell Stewart MID (130452) (RAFVR) (Navigator) PoW, Executed: 31 March 1944
Sergeant E J Tassell (1430017) (RAFVR) (Flight Engineer) PoW
Sergeant John Raymond Wells (1600931) (RAFVR) (Rear Gunner)
Flying Officer Stewart took part in the mass escape of Air Force officers from Sagan. He was re-captured and handed over to the Gestapo and was executed on or about 31 March 1944 and is buried in the Poznan Old Garrison Cemetery, Poland.
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, 166/33/30
Register of War Memorials in New South Wales On-Line