LEST WE FORGET
Sergeant Bruce Cathcart THOMPSON
Service No: 400299
Born: Traralgon VIC, 3 March 1917
Enlisted in the RAAF: 18 August 1940
Unit: No. 11 Operational Training Unit (RAF)
Died: Air Operations (No. 11 Operational Training Unit Wellington aircraft R1334), Hertfordshire, 22 July 1941, Aged 24 Years
Buried: Bassingbourn Cum Kneeworth Cemetery, cambridgeshire
CWGC Additional Information: Son of Leslie Samuel and Ethel May Thompson, of Parkdale, Victoria, Australia
Roll of Honour: Mordialloc VIC
Remembered: Panel 131, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
On the night of 21 July 1941 Wellington R1334 took off from the RAF Station Steeple Morden, Cambridgeshire, Satellite airfield detailed to carry out a night cross-country training exercise. The aircraft was destroyed as a result of a mid air collision with a JU88 at 0119 hours on 22 July over Ashwell, 6 miles north east from the centre of Letchworth, Hertfordshire. All the crew members were killed along with the three German crew members of the JU88.
The crew members of R1334 were:
Flight Sergeant Walter Anthony Hannah (748787) (RAFVR) (Second Pilot)
Sergeant Reginald Ernest Hibbert (1153276) (RAFVR) (Wireless Air Gunner)
Sergeant Frederick Slade Houston (R/68200) (RCAF) (Pilot)
Sergeant Claude Mortimer Spratt Lewis (1154594) (RAFVR) (Observer)
Sergeant Percival Theodore Manning (R/59283) (RCAF) (Wireless Air Gunner)
Sergeant Robert Andrew McAllister (404410) (Air Gunner)
Flight Sergeant Joseph Stewart (627588) (RAF) (Wireless Air Gunner)
Sergeant Bruce Cathcart Thompson (400299) (Third Pilot)
The crew members of the Ju88 were:
Lieutenant Heinz Volker
Fw Andreas Wurstl
Uffz Herbert Indenbirken
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 7 Operational Training Units 1940-1947, Midland Counties Publications UK, 2002
Commonwealth War Graves Commission On-Line Records
Department of Veterans’ Affairs On-Line WWII Nominal Roll
National Archives of Australia On-Line Record, A705, 163/166/108