Unidentified Grave

Discussion in 'The War In The Air' started by archivist, Jun 16, 2015.

  1. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    This propeller assembly was raised from the sea bed very close to where the aircraft went down. My question for the technically minded is this: did it come from a Mk 1c Wellington or a Consolidated Liberator (the only other wreck in the area)
     

    Attached Files:

  2. KevinBattle

    KevinBattle Senior Member

    You'd need to check the blade length dimensions for both aircraft relevant marks, or at least some sort of manufacturers ID plate/markings.
    First guess would be Liberator as blade looks to be greater than 6 ft
     
  3. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Hello Kevin,

    The photograph has recently been sent to me by a diver who recovered it many years ago whilst looking for something else. He was not sure of its identity at the time but disposed of it a long time ago so there is no possibility of checking the item itself.

    I have another photo of a different Wellington propeller recovered elsewhere and they look to be about the same size (by comparing them with people in the photos).

    I had hoped that there might be other identifying points. I have no expertise whatever in this field but it seems to me that Wellington propellers are a little more sharply pointed and Liberator propellers are a little flatter at the ends.

    The two aircraft crashed about half a mile apart but tides and currents in the area are strong and multi-directional so it is possible that the propeller could have come from either. I suppose we will never know.

    Neville
     
  4. Red Goblin

    Red Goblin Senior Member

    Whilst agreeing with Kevin on the desirability of definitive ID proof, I'm fairly sure that's far too pointy for a B-24J prop - from Consolidated Liberator "Jigs Up" - Google Search:
    Steve

    PS: Whoops, seems we cross-posted but I'm satisfied actual Jig's Up photos prove the point well enough

    PPS: Re our ongoing earlier discussion, I just noticed that 1st, M&CA, article says:
     
  5. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Hello Steve,

    With no knowledge whatever on that subject, I came to the same conclusion as you. I believe that the Wellington propeller is more pointed and the Liberator propeller has a more flattened end. Kevin made the point about it belonging to a Liberator if it was more than six feet long but where do you measure from? I also have a photo of an undisputed Wellington propeller brought up from the depths and, using people in the photos as a guide, they don't look a great deal different in size.

    However, I took Kevin's advice and sent the photo to Brooklands Museum asking their opinion and I am waiting anxiously for a reply. The whereabouts of the original propeller is unknown or we might be able to check it for marks.

    Neville
     
  6. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    In the last few minutes, another photo has appeared. I don't know how this will affect opinions!

    Neville
     
  7. Red Goblin

    Red Goblin Senior Member

    Sorry Neville but maybe you're missing my point - the blade held by Graham Wright, in my directly-linked post 144 photo, was reckoned to be actually from the Jigs Up - thus virtually discounting the possibility that it had non-standard prop blades - so, unless you're thinking of another Liberator, that only leaves the Wellington as the source for something so obviously different. Still, the more opinions the better ...
     
  8. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Sorry, the new photo is refusing to upload. I will try again!
     

    Attached Files:

  9. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Thanks for that Steve - I actually agree with you but due to my lack of expertise, I would defer to the opinions of others anyway. Unless the propeller actually broke off on impact, I can't see how it would drift half a mile without the rest of the plane anyway.
    Neville
     
  10. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    The experts at Brooklands will not guarantee it but they believe that, due to the stronger curvature of the blades, it is probably from a Wellington not a Liberator.
     
  11. Red Goblin

    Red Goblin Senior Member

    Agreed but as you've yet to tell us exactly where they found the prop, my having already pointed out one massive discrepancy - "GE placemark set contrasting the RNLI's fix curiously 1.29m NNE of Coflein's" - back in post 128, I've no idea how you can be so precise. But, since you've coincidentally mentioned the same figure, it may be worth my quoting a contrary real life case from near the end of chapter 4 of Fighting Lights (1942) by John. E Cross - United Kingdom - WW2 Talk:
    "She" apparently being the aircraft, of course, and not a cartwheeling prop.

    That was on Dartmoor, BTW where objects were only likely to roll/slide downhill if anywhere from where they landed, but Z1172 crashed on water where it's already been said to have remained afloat for quite some time after crashing in a south-westerly 24.1–31 mph 'strong breeze' quite likely to have blown it NE of any immediately-sinkable bits that may have broken off. It's quite standard practice for air/road accident investigators to plot all the various evidential 'jigsaw pieces' on a chart, to see what story they tell, and I see no reason not to follow suit in these similarly-mysterious circumstances. In this case, for instance, I'd expect the prop's location to help resolve the aforesaid discrepancy - maybe even by telling us Coflein simply latched onto where the prop was found rather than where the RNLI reported the floating wreck.

    Steve
     
  12. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Hello Steve,

    The diver who found it said its location tallied more or less exactly with where the Lifeboat description placed it. It is just a nagging feeling (not based on logic or knowledge) that the lifeboat man's log entry was where they found the two bodies in the life raft. This would mean the aircraft sunk very quickly and near the point of impact and would give a little more credence to the "explosion" on impact reported elsewhere. Without meaning to insult the intelligence or ability of the Lifeboat man, the use of the word "wreckage" is easily forgivable if he meant the life raft. This was a very emotive and dangerous situation and even an educated man could be forgiven for such a minor slip.

    I understand the humanity of the situation (pulling the dead bodies of two young men out of the sea). I want the truth of the situation but not to the extreme of " he had a little dab of blue paint on the third button on his left sleeve."

    This crash point was also a kilometre or more from where "Jigs Up" sunk.

    Regards
    Neville
     
  13. RAFCommands

    RAFCommands Senior Member

    Z1172 is not the only Wellington in the close vicinity of South Stack.

    DV442 was reported as ditched 0.5 miles north.

    Props can be seperated and carried away from main wreck by being caught by fishing nets.

    Some are brought into harbour, some are dumped after being untangled from net on deck and some rip out of the net after being dragged for a distance.

    Unless your diver also reported geodesic wreckage in the near vicinity I would not link the prop to a particular loss.

    Ross
     
  14. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Hello Ross,

    Yes my diver did report the bulk of an aircraft in the location where he found the propeller. He confirmed that the aircraft was more or less exactly in the position I gave him (taken from the Lifeboat log entry at the time) which was in a line between the base of South Stack and Penrhos Point at a distance of less than 0.25 miles. He says it was half a mile from the Liberator wreck at North Stack.

    Meanwhile, I am trying to locate the actual propeller to see if it has any identifiable markings. I would rather ignore it than make a false attribution (although, without proof, I would state possibly or probably - depending on the strength of evidence).

    Neville
     
  15. Red Goblin

    Red Goblin Senior Member

    Thanks for drawing that to our attention Ross - just to make reasonably sure of no more contenders lurking unsuspected and being a visually-oriented person, I just ran a Coflein Mapping search with these local results only picking up two more maritime defence aircraft wrecks sufficiently far away and modern to ignore:
    maritime defence aircraft plotted nr Holyhead (Coflein).png
    This instantly tells me any prop found near the RNLI Z1172 fix - more or less spot on the initial 'S' of OS' blue "South Stack" legend just R of Coflein's DV442 pinhead - is far more likely to have belonged to DV442 than Z1172 ... unless, that is, their respective grid references were accidentally swapped at some point. I wonder if the evidence for DV442's location is strong enough to debunk that idea because, if not, that may be all we need to satisfactorily resolve our Z1172 anomaly if favour of the RNLI.

    I might add, incidentally casting colateral doubt on Coflein's B-24 position, having read that Jigs Up actually hit North Stack - Holyhead Town Guide 2015-2017 (5.44MB PDF) p14:
    Possibly erroneous hype, or partly true in only referring to odd bits thrown forward from Coflein's position, but I'm not yet well enough informed to dismiss it as Tommy rot ...

    Steve
     
  16. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    I am inclined to temporarily ignore the propeller as there is no way to be certain of its origin unless I am able to locate it and check it for manufacturer's marks etc. I am also very dubious of Coflein Mapping because several sources say that it hit the cliffs and I have a photograph of an airman inspecting a large piece of wreckage on those cliffs. This photo came from the records of the USAAF 36th Bomb Squadron (RCM) website. Other reports I have read state that the aircraft slid back into the sea - but not over 1 Km north west. The local newspaper, in a report dated 17th December 2014, also stated that it hit the cliffs.

    Coflein shows DV442 where the RNLI report states that Z1172 crashed. Ross said that it crashed half a mile north of that position and I have no reason to doubt him.

    Coflein also shows Z1172 about 2 Km south west of where it actually crashed.

    The only likely explanation is that there has been some error or errors made when converting positions from war time map references to the modern 1 Kilometre square grid.

    I do not claim expertise in this field but I spent three years in the plans department of the Land Registry with two secondments to the Ordnance Survey and I can read a map!

    Neville
     
  17. Red Goblin

    Red Goblin Senior Member

    I'm equally inclined to ignore the prop, per se, but discussion of it has usefully injected DV442 into the mix as a catalyst to further examine the positional evidence where I'm wondering if - like assessing the length of a long-jumper's attempt from their very first mark in the sand as opposed to wherever they ended up after that first contact - some semantic difference is being made between the initial point of impact and the final resting place of whatever may be regarded as the defining section (cockpit ?).

    From what little I've managed to dredge up about DV442 online - links below - please be aware that this, like Jigs Up, was trying to make it to RAF Valley and yielded at least one survivor but differed in the pilot's decision to ditch in the drink. It's its ditch position that was given as a ½m N of S Stack so not necessarily where it ended up on the seabed - it for instance occurring to me that a virtually-intact a/c would more likely glide a depth-dependent distance underwater rather than simply sink vertically like a wingless vessel or stone. According to the direction of currents at the time, such a hypothesis could easily explain it ending up where Coflein have plotted it whilst the distance to their supposed Z1172 position, whilst probably not impossible, seems unintuitively far. Now for those DV442 links:
    • Unaccounted airmen - 30-4-1942 (July 2009 RAF Commands forum thread involving Ross)
      esp. note from Henk Welting's post 7 (my stress on the incident reportage):
    • BROTHER KILLED IN WAR (Sep 2004 IoW County Press appeal re missing rear gunner LOCKHURST)
      apparent sister clearly not relying on Chorley, note the different emphasis:
    • WW11 RAF Casualties buried in Ireland (observer ROUGHAN's grave in Ennis, Co Claire)
    • Anglesey Seascape Character Assessment (8.89MB PDF) curiously, due to Jigs Up fame, only mentioning this one wreck to the exclusion of the other two. Yet another take from Holyhead Mountain's p105:
    Steve
     
  18. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Hello Steve,

    I do appreciate the drift factor of the aircraft but I find it hard to believe that DV442 drifted to more or less exactly where Z1172 allegedly sank. I also find it hard to believe that Z1172 drifted quite so far from where the Lifeboat crew reported it. And I totally disbelieve that Jigs Up bounced more than a kilometre from where it hit the cliffs!

    I know that the tides and currents are a bit peculiar in the area but all three drifted in different directions and for differing distances. Roughan's sister states that DV442 began to sink immediately. The main Lifeboat report indicates that the wreckage had sunk and the men were picked up from a life raft. So neither had time to drift far.

    My question is: Did Coflein just accept arbitrary positions or did they actually carry out a survey? If it were the latter, how did they establish which aircraft was which?

    Neville
     
  19. RAFCommands

    RAFCommands Senior Member

    Hi Neville,

    I can add a bit of information to your question based on being an external consultant for one of these type of studies.

    The bulk of aircraft crash data in Coflein are derived from desk study using published and unpublished list source. For the large part there is no validation on the entered data. The intent is to capture possible scope and leave survey/identification to funded academic projects.

    Some aircraft crash locations on land have been given the identity from MoD Licence application but this may or may not be the true identity.

    This also applies to English Heritage (wessex archaeology aircraft crash sites at sea scoping study), Canmore in Scotland etc

    UK Hydrography Department maintains a list of charted and un-charted sea bed anomalies which have varying degrees of description but rarely give identity, type or detail on aircraft wrecks.

    The intent in this case is to provide a list of hazards to surface navigation and a secondary intent to provide position for magnetic anomaly to aid ASW operations.

    Another private source whiich sometimes feeds into the above are "fisherman fasteners" but since this is linked to commercial livelyhood it is not readily available.

    So like on land there is a partial list of sea bed artefacts (buried and proud) that change condition with time and partial lists of crash location with various degrees of accuracy but no useful link or study of correlation between the lists.

    Ross
     
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  20. archivist

    archivist Well-Known Member

    Thanks Ross,

    I can see the sense in that. Unless I can track the actual propeller down and identify it, I think I will just leave that part out. For my purposes, the precise location is not vital so my final account will be just a little less detailed without losing anything from the story.

    Neville
     

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