This is not your squadron but I thought you would like the pictures and story Mr Campbell.

http://www.lancastermuseum.ca/s,lastmission.html

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.

Thanks for the link and the story. I read all I can find and appreciate your interest. Alex Campbell

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Our friend, Scott Johnston, interviewed dad about the night of July 28, 1944 and has posted the interview here (bottom of the page at site):
http://www.lancasterdiary.net/collea...nd_friends.php
This is a detailed, minute by minute, account filled with details of the last minutes of the flight and first contact with the French community.
Skipper, in this account, Dad recalls some details about the houses he approached. "It was just a small gathering of houses – maybe four houses," this may help determine the first place he was concealed.

Wayne

The most interesting is not the details about the houses but the fact that your father was at the Arthurs with two other fliers (Raf + Rcaf) . Do you know their names? Joe Foreman RCAF crashed on July 25th at St Laurent , south of Chateaudun. Another crew crash at Villampuy (near Auvilliers) on July 26th (evaders= Justason, Calderwood, Gumbsby, Kenley ,Chamberlain MacDonald ) they are all RCAF except Kenley and Chamberlain who are RAF.

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Great news, I have just seen a draft of the art design of Ju88G1 4R+A4 and Lanc AC2 by Christian, it is really taking shape. The Bristol Hercules are awesome. He emphasized the colours of the rings around the the engines and matched them with the clouds and landscape. They almost have a copper aspect instead....

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More interesting all the time. Thanks for the update Skipper. E A Campbell

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Skipper : on the 88G-1

4R+A4 ? ah that should read something else, no 4 at the end of the code

E ~

my spelling mistake, it's 4R+AK you scared me for a minute Erich.

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Does anybody know Strassner's Werknummer?

A.C = JU88 G-1 4R+AK. It must start with 71.... (July 1944)

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Some news: Alex Campbell is in the paper today! The other day I saw a journalist taking pictures of our local square that had been renovated. I invited the man over for lunch and told him about my association called "Aviator Memories". He said that that he could write an article for me asking for people who had information about WWII crashes to call me . I though tthis was a great opportunity to find info about the A2-C crash. The article is general and mentions several works I am dealing with, but there are a few lines + a picture about the Alex Campbell crew. I already had two phone calls , including one from Freteval. It was a man inviting me to the yearly commemorations. Another was an Indo-China war veteran who knows how to find another Lancaster south of my hometown. If there is interest I can scan the article (I'll just take out my phone number)

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To the Campbells. 2 technical questions:

Christian and myself saw a bunch of pictures from 514Squadron aircrafts with Yellow (or white ) stripes on the tail section. Some data says MkIIs had those yellow stripes from June 1944 , other pictures show no stripes at all. So just to make sure; was A2-c fitted with those? chrsitian has not painted any, but he can stil ladd them.
Also, some MkIIs had a small ersatz of a turret near the bomb hatch. These were usually built on MKI's but some MKIIs with Bristol Hercules had those too. It was hardly ever used, especially in the dark, but did A2-C have one of these?

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I would like to read the article Skipper !
Also how about a sample picture of the work so far ?

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.

A2-C had no stripes nor a turret near the bomb hatch. Good thinking Skipper.
EAC

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Thank you for your quick answer, I have forwarded it immediately as the painting is almost done now.

TA, about the sample. I'll see what I can do when it's done. Firstly this got to be a surprise for the Campbells, so we don't want to show anything before it's finished, secondly we"ll send the drawing directly to them. I'll see if I can post a public version (low resolution).Christian has spend over 100 hours drawing this and he'd rather not want the full version on the internet

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I will look foward to seeing it !

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.

Ta there is actually a sample somewhere on the site, but you will have to wait until Alex Campbell finds it first.

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I recently presented this story at a professional activity day for teachers. A group of 40 teachers followed the story from the first post in March, 2006 through the detective work of Skipper, Erich and others to identify Strassner, up to the current information about the crash site and possible location of the aircraft.

Dad is coming up to visit next week. While he is here our local paper is planning an interview, featuring this story and the role the Internet and this forum played in discovering the details. As I mentioned before, this thread, and others like it, have become important documents.

Hello, there is still a surprise waiting for your dad on the forum. He will discover it automatically when he returns on the thread or checks his public profile.

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Pretty neat ! I bet he will like seeing it on all his posts.

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.

Glad you saw it TA. This is of course a sample the original can be enlarged 1600%.

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You guys in France must have really huge monitors !

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.

I wish I had. At this size we check details on small surfaces, like rivets .