James Bales was killed on a hillside at Eastbourne, East Sussex, UK when his B24D Liberator named Ruth-Less crashed whilst attempting to land at a small airfield near the village of Friston.
The crew had departed from their base at Shipdham, Norfolk for an attack on a V2 missile assembly bunker at Watten, in the Foret d'Eperlecques near St Omer, northern France. The aircraft sustained damage from flak on its bombing run and could not make it back to its base. An emergency landing was attempted in southern England, but in very poor weather conditions and with the loss of one engines, the aircraft could not outclimb the cloud shrouded hill in front of it.
Initially Bales and the rest of the crew were intered at Brookwood Cemetary near Woking in Surrey, but after war some of the crew's families had their bodies repatriated back to the USA.
There is a book called "Ruth-Less and Far From Home" that tells the story of what happened to Bales. Many of the families had no idea that their loved ones had been killed on English soil, but due to the secrecy at war time, were simply informed they had died "somewhere in the ETO (European Theatre of Operations)
This interesting information was provided to me by this e-mail address: [email protected]
The crew had departed from their base at Shipdham, Norfolk for an attack on a V2 missile assembly bunker at Watten, in the Foret d'Eperlecques near St Omer, northern France. The aircraft sustained damage from flak on its bombing run and could not make it back to its base. An emergency landing was attempted in southern England, but in very poor weather conditions and with the loss of one engines, the aircraft could not outclimb the cloud shrouded hill in front of it.
Initially Bales and the rest of the crew were intered at Brookwood Cemetary near Woking in Surrey, but after war some of the crew's families had their bodies repatriated back to the USA.
There is a book called "Ruth-Less and Far From Home" that tells the story of what happened to Bales. Many of the families had no idea that their loved ones had been killed on English soil, but due to the secrecy at war time, were simply informed they had died "somewhere in the ETO (European Theatre of Operations)
This interesting information was provided to me by this e-mail address: [email protected]
James Bales was killed on a hillside at Eastbourne, East Sussex, UK when his B24D Liberator named Ruth-Less crashed whilst attempting to land at a small airfield near the village of Friston.
The crew had departed from their base at Shipdham, Norfolk for an attack on a V2 missile assembly bunker at Watten, in the Foret d'Eperlecques near St Omer, northern France. The aircraft sustained damage from flak on its bombing run and could not make it back to its base. An emergency landing was attempted in southern England, but in very poor weather conditions and with the loss of one engines, the aircraft could not outclimb the cloud shrouded hill in front of it.
Initially Bales and the rest of the crew were intered at Brookwood Cemetary near Woking in Surrey, but after war some of the crew's families had their bodies repatriated back to the USA.
There is a book called "Ruth-Less and Far From Home" that tells the story of what happened to Bales. Many of the families had no idea that their loved ones had been killed on English soil, but due to the secrecy at war time, were simply informed they had died "somewhere in the ETO (European Theatre of Operations)
This interesting information was provided to me by this e-mail address: [email protected]
The crew had departed from their base at Shipdham, Norfolk for an attack on a V2 missile assembly bunker at Watten, in the Foret d'Eperlecques near St Omer, northern France. The aircraft sustained damage from flak on its bombing run and could not make it back to its base. An emergency landing was attempted in southern England, but in very poor weather conditions and with the loss of one engines, the aircraft could not outclimb the cloud shrouded hill in front of it.
Initially Bales and the rest of the crew were intered at Brookwood Cemetary near Woking in Surrey, but after war some of the crew's families had their bodies repatriated back to the USA.
There is a book called "Ruth-Less and Far From Home" that tells the story of what happened to Bales. Many of the families had no idea that their loved ones had been killed on English soil, but due to the secrecy at war time, were simply informed they had died "somewhere in the ETO (European Theatre of Operations)
This interesting information was provided to me by this e-mail address: [email protected]
Gravesite Details
T/Sgt Killed over France
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