On the night of the 23 September 1943 the crew of Lancaster ED 702, piloted by P/O Cyril T Anderson, were lost without trace whilst on an operation over Mannheim. Reports of the night from returning crews reported heavy numbers of German Night Fighters over the target. This was their 22nd operation as a crew. That night Bomber Command lost 18 Lancasters, 7 Halifaxes and 7 Wellingtons and all their crews.
It is believed that ED 702 was shot down by Lt Heinz Grimm and that the crash happened near Insheim. The local Catholic Priest, Revd Jakob Storck and local residents buried the bodies in a local churchyard.
Jakob remembers:
” In the night from 23/24 September at about 23.30 o’clock a horrific bombing raid started over Ludwigshafen and Frankenthal. Flying back from the strike, over 30 allied bombers were shot down. One of them also crashed here. It came down over our church not very high crashing next to the church of Insheim. I will never forget the view of its fire-tail…All of those men in that plane died. Two of them bailed out, but also died. Those who stayed inside were found hacked to death and terribly burned. They were registered by the Wehrmacht, and because there were so many of them found in that night, also in Herxheim, Flemlingen…etc, the mayor asked me to bury them-there should be a priest with them the mayor said. So I did it. Five of them on Sunday the 26th of September and the other two aircrew men on Tuesday the 28th of September. The following nights there were some more disturbing. But in October everything was quiet… ”
In April 1948 the crew were moved to the Rheinberg British War Cemetery.
L to R: Jock Paterson, Jimmy Green, Doug Bickle, Arthur Buck, Cyril Anderson and John Nugent
Below are some eyewitness statements, kindly provided by Katja Bauer
Edwin:
I was 16 years old at the time and had night care work that night. The bombers and bombs could be heard in the village, although the cities of Ludwigshafen and Mannheim are about 50 km away. I think it was around midnight when I saw bombers on the return flight.
One of them was deep and burning. He flew towards Offenbach and went lower and lower. It was the Lancaster ED 702 with its crew, which I have now learned.
Liselotte.
That night was terrible again, I was 14 years old and we, me and my family were hiding in the basement because we had a flight alarm. We heard the bombers fly over us.
The next day, September 24, 1943 was a wonderfully warm autumn day. We made our way to the field and in the wangert to work. On the way there we heard rumours that a bomber crashed in Offenbach during the night.
On the way to our field work we discovered a body in a tree hanging on a parachute. It was a man, he was dead. The older residents spat and insulted him. You could see that it was not a German. In his uniform he had a letter for Canada. So, we assumed it was a Canadian.
The men cut the young man off the tree, looking for items the man could use. The women set about the parachute, which you could use. Liessel takes pity on the young man. Maybe he was just 20 years old, the same age as her brother who was still at war.
The older residents blamed the unknown for everything that they had to experience at the moment.
After cutting the body free, it was first brought to the morgue in Ottersheim. A day later, after it was clear that it should have been an inmate of the crashed bomber in Offenbach, the body was brought to Offenbach to the others of the crash.
During various visits by eyewitnesses over the night, or field workers from September 24, 1943, I presented various photos of men. Everyone was certain and pointed to Jimmy independently.
“It was He, I will never forget this young face,” said another eyewitness.
Our thanks to both Katja Bauer and to Dom Howard from www.lancasterbombers.net for his valuable research and continued support of the IBCC.
The crew are all remembered on the Walls at the Centre and in the IBCC Losses Database https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/
