Personnel Index - Detail

Name
WARWICK
First Names
James Brown
Rank
Squadron Leader
Service
RAF
Service Number
1393272
Crew Position
Navigator
Posting In
Posted in 5/43 and out 1/44

 

Awarded the DFC.

Flew 27 operations with 49Sqn.

S/L Warwick was killed on 19th September 1944 flying as Navigator with Guy Gibson in a Mosquito of 627Sqn on a raid to Rheydt.

He is buried in the Steenbergen General Cemetery.



Photographed by Dom Howard.
 


 

Extract is from Bill Chorley's Bomber Command Losses
 

49Sqn Association
 



A very atmospheric image taken of the cemetery in the 1970s...........S/L Warwick's grave is on the right.
 



A more recent image of the grave site.

Additional information from "The Dog at War" by John Ward:
On Wednesday 20 September, the world learned the news that the famous 'Dambuster' leader, Guy Gibson, was missing from air operations. Days later it was confirmed that he and his navigator, S/Ldr Jim 'Paddy' Warwick were dead.

Their 627 Squadron Mosquito (KB267) E-Easy, had crashed on Walcheren in Holland after the Rheydt raid on the night of the 19th. Jim Warwick, a pleasant, gentle Ulsterman, had flown his first tour on Lancasters with 49 Squadron, Fiskerton, between June and December 1943. He and his fellow crew members, (piloted by P/O Hales) had come through operations to the Ruhr, Hamburg, Peenemunde and Berlin, and in doing so suffered more than their share of adversity.

After his tour, Jim helped establish the radar navigation section at 1661 HCU, Winthorpe. Later, he transferred to 54 Base at Coningsby, where he and his girlfriend were planning to get engaged. W/Cmdr Gibson had asked Jim if he would be his navigator for just this one trip.

S/Ldr Warwick DFC and W/Cmdr Gibson VC, DSO, DFC rest together in
Steenbergen, Holland.