Personnel Index - Detail
From the panel at Runnymede
6/7 October, 1944; BREMEN:
1 and 5 Groups combined their efforts once again, when 246 Lancasters delivered a tremendous 'hammer blow' to Bremen. On a clear moonlit night, the Mosquitoes had little difficulty in marking the aiming point before calling the Main Force in to bomb. Large fires were soon started; F/O Russell (PB370) and crew reported that the glow from the fires could be seen 100 miles away.
The squadron had dispatched 17 aircraft and decided to send five new crews on the raid.
Aircraft started to request landing instructions shortly after 22.00hrs but by 22.38hrs, only 15 had landed back at Fiskerton. Into the early hours of Saturday morning, it became clear that for the first time since 28/29 July the squadron had suffered casualties.
The crew members in F/O Harrop's aircraft have no known graves but are remembered on the Runnymede Memorial, except for their Canadian bomb aimer, P/O Ernest Russell who is buried in Risor Cemetery, 25 kilometres from Arendal in Norway.
Lancaster PB353 (EA-E)
F/O K. Harrop Pilot (Missing)
Sgt J.G. McKenzie F/E (Missing)
P/O R.D. Scott RCAF NAV (Missing)
Sgt J.S. McClenahan W/OP (Missing)
Sgt S. Hodgkinson A/G (Missing)
P/O E.A. Russell A/B (Killed)
F/S T. Rees A/G (Missing)
Crew on their 4th operation