FLIGHT LIEUTENANT BRONISLAW FRANCISZEK LEWKOWICZ

He was born on 9th March 1913 in Jaruslaw, Poland, and after graduating from Grammar school he joined the Army Cadet Corps No 3 in Rawicz. In 1934 he was admitted to an artillery officer school in Torun and in 1939, he completed a course for air observer / navigators and was posted to the 212 Eskadra of the 1st Air Regiment in Warsaw. In September 1939 he was captured by the Russians but escaped and made his way to England via Romania and France. He joined 304 Squadron and took part in a number of bombing missions to Germany. He was awarded the Cross of Valour, for bravery in action, by Air Vice Marshal Ujejski on 28th June 1941 (he won this medal on a total of four occasions) and later the Order of Virtuti Militari on 21st November 1941 also by Air Vice Marshal Ujejski. He survived the crash landing of R1697 at RAF Lindholme on 24th April 1942. The aircraft jettisoned its bombs from 16,500 feet over Flensburg, Germany following a surprise attack by a Messerschmidt Me110 fighter. The aircraft was damaged and the pilot (Squadron Leader Czetowicz) and rear gunner (P/O Apanasik) were struck by bullets but all survived and made it safely home. He was in charge of the advance party to RAF Tiree on 7th May 1942. In 1943 he volunteered for service with the Armia Krajowa, which was the main underground organization in Poland, and he was parachute into Poland as an SOE operative. He eventually became second in command of the AK 25th Infantry Regiment. Under the pseudonym of Kurs, he became involved in an action against the SS Galizien Division in which he was badly wounded and later died. He was buried in the cemetery at Leceniczowka. After the war he was exhumed and buried in the Catholic cemetery at Gielniowo.

AN EYE WITNESS REPORT TO THE CRASH OF R1268

The following is an eye witness account from one of two teenage boys (Tom and Jacky Lamb) who were present at the time of the crash; this is a verbatim account and all spelling and grammatical mistakes have been faithfully copied except that the original was in block capitals and contained a sketch of the scene. The author, Tom Lamb, went on to become a very well respected pitman artist.

“It was December 14th 1.30pm 1940.
My brother and I were in Millwood to gather holly for Xmas. We suddenly heard a sound. It’s a plane. There she is Jacky shouted, coming over our village just above the trees. It seemed to be coming straight above us rocking from side to side and losing height. We became aware the huge bomber was heading for West Edmondsley Farm. It was a very dark colour except for the very bright ring markings in the dull light of the December afternoon.

The pilot turned a hard right to avoid the farm, and with, a loud crash dropped into a wooded riverine with a stream running through. ‘Wardels Wood’. My stomack felt sour as I remembered the last plane crash. Oh please don’t let them die! We soon arrived at the crash. A sorry sight met us. The first thing we saw was the huge tail fin. The plane had brocken its back, leaving the tial- fin and the main part of the fuselarge on the slope of the [deletion] riverine its wings spreading out in the valley, and its nose broken open in the stream, with the pilot strapped in his seat, open to the air. Only one of the four airman could walk. He had injured his forhead. The others were alive but badly injured.

Jacky and the farm workers carried the airmen to the farm house, using an old door, as a stretcher. The airman who could walk got the maps and other various documents from the plane, and came up the slope towards where I was standing near the tal-fin. He turned and looked back at the crash. He asked me, where are we? I told him County Durham. I walked with him to the farmhouse, and was met by Mrs Lawton who said the doctor had arrived, and was given morphian to the other airmun, and dressing their wounds. The airman was in a state of shock and mumbling that they were on a training flight and got [deletion] short of fuel.

Soldiers arrived from their camp at Edmondsley to guard the aeroplane. And to take the airmun to Chester-le-Street Hospital. The Polish airman all survived. The bomber was a Vickers Wellington No R1268 604 Sqn. [error should be 304] Some of the ladys of the village would visit the airmun in hospital.”

All in all, this is an excellent, and mainly accurate, description – not sensationalised (as you might expect) by a teenage boy. The sketch is also very good and clearly shows the geodetic framework. Unfortunately, the copy I have is a very poor quality photocopy and cannot be reproduced here.

TWO MORE MYSTERY CRASHES

I have spent the last month reviewing information I have received and I have come across two more crashes that have been only lightly recorded:

HE304 17th July 1943

Recorded only in the RAF Davidstow Moor Operations Record Book and Dennis Burke’s excellent website on foreign aircraft landings in the Irish Republic. This Wellington Mk X was returning from an anti-submarine patrol over the Bay of Biscay when it ran out of fuel. The crew baled out and landed safely in Carlow and the aircraft crashed near Ballickmoylar, Co Laois. Three aircraft were sent out to look for it but found no trace as they did not violate Irish neutrality by searching over the Republic. The crew returned to Britain and continued to fight; they were Sgt Stanislaw Kieltyka, Sgt Remigiusz Duszczak, Sgt Karol Stefan Pasieka, Sgt Mieczyslaw Franciszek Salewicz, Sgt Mikolaj Pawluczyk and Sgt Wladyslaw Kaczan.

HE150 7th November 1943

During the course of a Leigh Light exercise, this aircraft suffered engine problems and attempted an emergency landing at RAF Haverfordwest with disastrous results. The crew are unknown but the pilot was Flight Lieutenant A A Kasprzyk and the co-pilot was Sergeant Karol Polanin. The accident report is difficult to read but the following is a transcript:

EF [Engine Failure] Loss of revs on port engine. Pilot of HF150 [error, should be HE150] decided to land at strange airfield, overshot and went round again and on final landing struck unlighted a/c 615
Close to midway. Co-pilot could have returned to base. COF Airfield controller to blame gave 615 green permission to cross runway should have given 150 a red when he saw him coming in to land the second time 1000 yards away. Pilot of 150 allowed his a/c to drift and did not synchronise his motors. Did not get a green to land 2nd time. CO Commanding pilot of 150 to blame AOF Pilot to blame. Discip action. A/O CinC agrees with AOC.

The results of any disciplinary action are unknown, but both aircraft were destroyed in the ensuing fire.

I cannot understand why these crashes are omitted from so many major websites. HE150 was a training accident, so maybe that is understandable, but HE304 was an operational loss.

SERGEANT FERDYNAND MICEL

This is a photograph of Sergeant Ferdynand Micel who was the subject of my last post. It is a detail cropped from the 1942 fliers photograph and gives a clearer picture of the man himself. My own father, though not a Pole, was also a refugee who enlisted and fought for Britain. It seems to me that there are striking similarities between my dad and Patrick's. No, they don't look alike but they were both clean cut young men who suffered the loss of their home land (although I have to say Patrick's father suffered greater hardships). In the wake of all this, they were both ordinary men who were sent out to do extraordinary things; dreadful things that decent men should never have to do. In spite of personal danger, fear and every other human emotion, they just got on and did it. They deserve every free man's respect and that is why people like me and Patrick will always try to honour and preserve their memory.

ANTI-SUBMARINE WARFARE

Taken at St Andrews, 1942, just after arriving in Britain; he is 4th from the left on the 4th row back

Taken in Poland before the War; the inscription reads Instructors and Trainees. He is second from the right, lying down

Fliers 1942; he is on the back row, extreme right

I have received the above 3 photographs from Patrick Micel, whose father, Sgt Ferdynand Micel, fought with 304 Squadron during their Coastal Command days. Once again, I felt strange looking at the faces of the men I have been researching for so long - especially when I can now put a face to a name that I have been working with. Like so many Poles, he ran away to fight another day (in France) then again in Britain. Thank God the Poles didn't know when to give up because we'd have been in dire straits without them. Heroes one and all. Anyway, here's his story:

MICEL Ferdynand (Sgt)
Attacked and damaged a U – Boat in the English Channel on 21st June 1944. He was born in Berdjansk, Ukraine but lived mostly in Bialystock, Poland until he was captured by the Russians on 17th September 1939. He was sent to Krzywy Rog then Siewzeldorlag in Siberia on 11th September 1940 where he suffered the mental torture of at least one “mock” execution, involving a night in the condemned cell and a visit from a priest. In 1941 he was transferred to Juza camp in Iwanowska province and then, on 4th September 1941, he was able to come to the UK from Archangel. He trained on gliders at Leeming and Sutton Bank and then spent time with 304 Squadron in Coastal Command. Later he flew weather flights from RAF Aldergrove (Belfast) and served at Hullavington, Syerston and Hornchurch ending up at Gan in the Maldives. He survived the war and died on 6th April 1983 in Leicester and his ashes are buried in Wrexham, Wales beside his mother and sister.

WELLINGTON BOMBER HX384 PARTS SALVAGED

On the way to an anti-submarine sweep, this aircraft was struck by ferocious cross winds and failed to take off. It was blown over the edge of the cliffs by the runway at RAF Dale and the entire crew were killed.
The wreckage was found on 21st September 1991 by divers from the Llantrisant Sub Aqua Club. Subsequently machine guns and propellers were recovered and restored; one of each is now on display at the ATC museum, Abergavenny, South Wales. A similar set was donated to the Polish people in a ceremony aboard the sailing ship Iskra on 15th July 1993, which was attended by members of the Polish Military and War Veterans Association. The vessel was docked at Newcastle upon Tyne for the Tall Ships Race. These relics are now housed in the Military Museum in Warsaw. The picture shows members of the club with a propeller recovered from the wreck.

WELLINGTON BOMBER - ENIGMA OF W5627

On the night of 27/28 April 1942, W5627 was shot down on its way home from a bombing mission to Cologne and crashed near Chatel_Censoir, France. There are reports that Sergeants Lipski and Polesinski were killed but RAF records show that Lipski was captured and interned in camps L3 and 4B. Polesinski also survived and escaped to Gibraltar. Mariusz Konarski states that the whole crew were interned and later returned to England. Other reports claim 2 fatalities but do not name them. The pilot, F/O Julian Morawski escaped via the Free French Zone and into Spain where he was interned but escaped and made it to England.

That leaves 2 crew members with stories untold so if anyone has information on them, I'd love to hear from you. Their names are Wacinski and Woznial.