Operation: Luxembourg
Date: May 10th 1940 (Friday)
Unit: 12 Squadron
Type: Fairey Battle Mk I
Serial: L5190
Code: PH-P
Base: RAF Amifontaine, Northern France
Location: Belly-landed near Kiem Kirchberg Luxemburg
Pilot: Plt.Off. Albert William Matthews 40003 RAF - injured PoW No: 1261 *
Nav: Sgt. A.A. Maderson RAF - injured PoW - confined in Hospital due injuries. Repatriated October 1943
Air Gnr: LAC. J.C. Senior RAF - injured PoW No: 5786 **
* Stalag Luft 3, Sagan-Silesia, Germany, now Żagań in Poland. (Moved to Nuremberg-Langwasser, Bavaria).
** Stalag Luft 6, Heydekrug, Memelland (now Šilutė in Lithuania).
REASON FOR LOSS:
Airborne at 17:15 hrs from RAF Amifontaine.
L5190 had orders to attack enemy troop columns reported between Luxembourg and Junglinster, 14 km NNE of Luxembourg. Shot down by small arms ground fire in the target area. Belly-landed near Kirchberg at 17:45 hrs.
Above and below L5190 being inspected by German troops.
Area of operations and loss
Above: Plt.Off. Albert Matthews; Left Image - First solo flight on June 14, 1937 in plane DH Tiger Moth 82 G-ADXP. Centre Image - In uniform standing in front of a Hawker Hart airplane with a 12 cylinder Rolls Royce Kestrel engine. (Courtesy: Greg McGrath)
Cutting from the Times Colonist (Victoria, British Columbia) - 18th January 1941. Plt.Off. Albert W. Matthews is 5th from the left. (Courtesy: Greg McGrath)
12 Squadron at the Amifontaine airbase, Northern France
The squadron lost 2 other aircraft during this operation, another was damaged but repaired:L5249 Flown by 22 year old Plt.Off. Cecil Laing Hulse 70860 RAF - hit by ground fire - repaired but later abandoned. (Plt.Off. Hulse died in hospital on the 4th June 1940 of an illness not connected with operations)
P2243 Flown by Flt.Lt. Hunt - hit by ground fire, aircraft abandoned. All crew safe.
L4949 Flown by Flt.Lt. W. Simpson - hit by ground fire, crash landed. All crew safe.
Burial details:
None - all the crew survived the crash landing.
Researched by Michel Beckers for Aircrew Remembered, March 2015. Photographs courtesy of Michel Beckers. Thanks to Greg McGrath for the images and newspaper cutting for Plt.Off. Matthews and the PoW newspaper cutting.
RS 05.04.2020 - Addition of PoW image
MB 03.2015 - Initial upload
RS 28.02.2019 - Inclusion of Images for P/O. Matthews
RS 05.04.2020 - Addition of PoW image
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning we will remember
them. - Laurence
Binyon
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Last Modified: 11 March 2021, 17:11