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Originally Posted by gen  You guys are awesome. Thankyou all so much. Harry i look forward to reading what you have on the squadron. Owen this is great as i now know what he did, next stop the local library to see if they have anything on him and the rest of casualties you guys have helped me with. Anymore info will also be appreciated.
Thanks again guys
Mike |
In their time at Lissett,No 158 Squadron despatched more than 1300 Halifax individual operations in 1943. By 1944 this figure had risen to 2633 Halifaxes despatched.More than 100 Halifaxes failed to return in 1944 alone. In the last few months of the war ,841 Halifaxes were despatched against 12 who failed to return.This squadron's targets were mostly directed against the German industrial targets
Total aircrew losses from its formation was 851 aircrew kia and these lie in cemeteries throughout Europe with 78 airmen having no known graves.Over 340 aircrew became POWs and 61 went on to be successful evaders and returned to the UK by various routes.
Friday the Thirteenth,LV 907 was a very famous aircraft which completed 128 operations but was soc after the war.Its name lives on with the Yorkshire Air Museum museum piece, LV 907 on display butis a rebuild of the fuselage of HR 792 and the wings of Hastings TG 536.As a new aircraft,LV 907 was delivered from HP and immediately went on to its first operation at the end of March 1944 to Nuremburg,a raid which resulted in disasterous losses for Bomber Command.From this date LV 907, completed 128 operations to the end of the war.One rear gunner who completed a tour on this aircraft relates it was a fine aircraft to handle and surprisingly revealed that he never had to fire his guns in anger throughout the tour.
Lissett was a target for Luffewaffe intruder raids and lost one aircraft withou survivors during the widespread intruder raids on Bomber Command airfields on 3 March 1945 when the Halifax was in circuit about to land.Other Halifax gunners having just landed,returned fire as the aircraft, thought to be a Junkers 88, strafed the airfield.Apparently the Station Commander,Group Captain Tom Sawyer in the watch tower at time manned a Bren,firing at the intruder from the watch tower roof.
Lissett was favourably placed being a few miles from the North Sea and was one of the Bomber Command's airfields which was nearest to German targets.It was only a few miles from the large Bomber Command emergency landing strip at Carnaby although there are no reports that the squadron ever used it in emergency.
In 2005, the squadron unveiled a memorial garden seat in the Park Resorts Caravan Park at Barmston to the crew of Halfax MZ 286 which crashed into Bridlington Bay off Barmston on 18 July 1944 minutes after taking off before daybreak for support operations against Caen,one of three squadron Halifaxes lost on this operation.
The squadron is remembered by a memorial erected on 9 Setember 1984 in the grounds of St James of Compostela Church in the village of Lissett. The squadron motto "Strength in Unity", crest and the sketch of a Halifax are inscribed on the memorial plaque.
During the past year,23 veterans have passed away but reunions still attract ex wartime squadron members from Australia,the US, Canada and the UK. Last year 30 ex members of the squadron met with 60 associates at Bridlington for the annual reunion which how been locally based to Lissett for nearly 30 years.