Young Canadian Airmen Remembered
on a Welsh Mountainside
By EIFION WILLIAMS
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THE PHOTOGRAPH of the young airman found in the wreckage of Wellington MF-509 and posted on the internet by Caroline Davies.
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On November 11 we will again honour the memories of the young men and women who gave their lives for their country on battlefields far from home. Frequently overlooked by history are those who died before they even reached the battlefields, many while in transit or in training exercises in friendly countries.
During the Second World War, aircrew training played a vital role in providing a steady flow of aircraft for the Allied war effort.
Many of these training flights took place over Wales, whose mountains are notorious for rapid weather deterioration causing pilots to become disoriented.
This, combined with the fact that inexperienced crews often flew in older aircraft prone to mechanical failure, occasionally resulted in deadly consequences.
As a boy growing up in Cwmgiedd, a village at the foot of the Black Mountain (Mynydd Du), now part of the Brecon Beacons National Park, I remember hearing accounts of aircraft that had crashed on the mountain during the war and of the participation of local people in rescuing downed flyers or recovering their bodies.
Today, on a day's walk from Cwmgiedd, one can visit the crash sites of two Wellington bombers, one carrying a British and one a Canadian six-man crew. A Lancaster with an eight-man British crew, and a B24 Liberator carrying six Americans.
The men all died in this relatively small area on the Welsh mountains. There are around 350 such crash sites in North and mid-Wales. Over the years, local individuals and organizations have built memorials and regularly placed wreaths at many of the sites.
A few years ago, I visited the crash site of Vickers Wellington MF-509, which crashed on the night of November 20, 1944, while on a night cross-country exercise from the 22nd Operational Training Unit (OTU) at Wellesbourne Mountford, near Stratford-On-Avon.
According to the accident report, the aircraft developed mechanical problems, probably icing on the carburetor, and crashed into Carreg Goch (Red Rock) on the Black Mountain. All six aircrew were killed. Remains of the aircraft can still be seen scattered over the mountainside and a stone memorial has been erected at the site.
As a Canadian, I was particularly interested in the plaque attached to the memorial cairn, which states that all the crew members were airmen of the Royal Canadian Air Force.
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The plaque placed on the memorial by his sister in memory of Bill Allison. It reads: "In memory of the visit of Bill Allison's sister to the site of his final flight on earth. I pray for peace in our world God bless the people of Wales. Phyllis Allison Burns. 2006."
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They were pilot Sargent Charles Hamel (21), navigator Sargent Jules Villeneuve (22), bomb aimer First Officer Joseph Allison (28), air gunner Sargent Joseph Burke (20), air gunner Sargent Arthur Groulx (22), and air gunner Sargent Gerald Dusablon (20).
I learned later that all the men were from the Montreal area, except Burke, who was from Bathurst, New Brunswick. They were all buried at Chester (Blacon) Cemetery and all were posthumously commissioned as officers in the Royal Canadian Air Force.
But this was not the end of the story of Wellington MF-509.
Two days after the crash in 1944, a local man named Eric Price visited the site and found in the wreckage a photograph of a young airman. There was no name or any other identification on the photograph, so Price put it away for safe keeping where it remained for 61 years.
In 2005 Price's granddaughter, Caroline Davies, sought to return the photograph to the airman's next of kin by posting it on the internet. Unfortunately, the photograph proved not to be one of the deceased aircrew members and the young airman has still not been identified. However, the search for his identity had wider ramifications.
As a result of Caroline Davies' search, the crash site of Wellington MF-509 came to the attention of Professor Christopher Milligan of McGill University's Faculty of Education, and Wes Cross of the Dean of Students Office in Montreal.
The two men had begun a project called McGill Remembers to mark the University's participation in the Second World War. It later emerged that three of the downed airmen were McGill alumni.
Wes Cross discovered that bomb aimer Joseph (Bill) Allison had a sister, Phyllis (Allison) Burns, living in Montreal and she was astonished to learn of the existence of the plane's wreckage and the memorial erected at the site.
Since then, family members of the other crew members have also been contacted. All had been informed in 1944 in the security language of the day that the plane had crashed "somewhere in England" and that the crew had been buried in Chester.
Wes Cross contacted local historians in Wales, some of whom were also enthusiastic mountain walkers such as Arwel Michael from Cwmgiedd.
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MCGILL DEAN OF STUDENTS Wes Cross at the crash site of Wellington MF-509.
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Arwel probably knows the Welsh mountains better than anybody, having walked the length and breadth of Wales. He is also very knowledgeable on the military crash sites in the Brecon Beacons.
In May, 2006, Wes Cross, Arwel Michael, Caroline Davies and several other locals who regularly tend the memorial, hiked up to the Wellington MF-509 crash site, where Wes Cross placed some commemorative artefacts, among them a Canadian flag and a small wooden plaque in memory of Bill Allison from his sister Phyllis.
He also performed a ceremony on behalf of the Villeneuve family and the First Peoples House, reflecting Jules Villeneuve's First Nations heritage, placing a native Indian prayer stone and a traditional offering of tobacco at the site.
Those present then held a brief prayer service, vowing that those who perished would not be forgotten.
In November 2006, McGill University put on a display in downtown Montreal to tell the story of Wellington MF-509 and the memorial on the Black Mountain. Also, a display about the crashed aircraft and Bill Allison was created in McGill's Department of Alumni Relations Building, showing photographs of the site and small parts of the wreckage brought over by Wes Cross. The display also features a Welsh flag.
On Remembrance Sunday last year, the annual service was held at the crash site with about 40 people attending. A wreath of poppies and several small crosses were placed at the memorial and daffodil bulbs were planted nearby to bloom the following spring. A similar service will be held again this year on Remembrance Day, November 11.
The Wellington MF-509 memorial is only one of the many Second World War crash sites in Wales tended by local people.
Anyone viewing these memorials will find it hard not to be moved by the fact that most of these young men were barely out of their teens and thousands of miles from the countries they had volunteered to serve.
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VIEW of the memorial site for Wellington MF-509.
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Even though their war ended on a Welsh mountainside, their courage and determination should not be overlooked or forgotten.
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