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Capt Philip Francis Lee Jr.

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Capt Philip Francis Lee Jr. Veteran

Birth
Baltimore, Baltimore City, Maryland, USA
Death
14 Aug 1941 (aged 35)
South Ayrshire, Scotland
Burial
Coton, South Cambridgeshire District, Cambridgeshire, England Add to Map
Plot
Plot G Row 4 Grave 162
Memorial ID
View Source
Casualty of WWII, he was one of 15 American citizens who died while serving with the RAF Ferry command or Air Transport Auxiliary, and who are commemorated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.He was a First Officer
with the Air Transport Auxiliary-Flight Captain, U.S. Army Air Forces-Royal Air Force Ferry Command.

He entered the service from Mississippi.

The victims of this tragedy are commemorated, though not by name, on a special memorial in Ayr Cemetery where many of the British and Canadian airmen are interred.The memorial was erected as a result of a subscription by the inhabitants of Whitletts as a token of respect.

He was a member of the Lee family of Virginia/Maryland.
His family went to Mississippi when Philip left for the UK.

Washington Post front page story on 8/16/1941:
Captain Lee, British Crash Victim, Was Scion of Old Md. Family:



Special Dispatch to the post
Frederick, Md., Aug. 15.
Captain Philip F. Lee, Jr. 34, of Urbana, Md., ferry pilot for the British, who was killed in yesterday's airliner crash in England, went to Canada last September to join the Canadian Air Force.
He had been flying for ten years and was the son of Philip F. Lee, Sr., Vice President of the U. S. Fidelity & Guaranty Co., Baltimore, and a brother of J. Tyson Lee, member of Maryland's House of Delegates.
His wife and a 5-year-old daughter, a brother, Augustus W. Lee, Pittsburg, and a sister, Miss Georgine Lee, Urbana, also survive.Captain Lee worked for the U. S. Fidelity & Guaranty Co. before going to Canada and had lived with their parents at their home, Sugarloaf Farm, near Urbana.
He was a member of a family prominent in Maryland since colonial days.During the last Ohio Valley flood, Captain Lee used his plane to fly refugees out of danger areas and to bring in supplies. Last spring he started to ferry planes across the ocean. While he was on this side of the Atlantic he maintained a home with his wife and daughter in Montreal.Captain Lee was born in Baltimore December 14, 1905. He was educated in the public school at Urbana, in Honolulu and at the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, from which he was graduated. While at Polytechnic he was a South Atlantic swimming champion. He studied mechanical engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
The Lee family settled in Frederick County in colonial days and the family seat, Needwood, near Burkettsville, is still owned by a branch of the family.Captain Lee was a descendant of Thomas Sim Lee, Governor of Maryland from 1779 to 1782 and from 1792 to 1794.

The Baltimore Evening Sun ran a similar front page story on the 15th:
MARYLAND PILOT, 11 OTHERS FROM U.S. KILLED IN BRITAIN
Ferry Bomber Falls After Taking Off;
Purvis is Victim
[By the Associated Press]
London, Aug. 15.
Twelve American Flyers enlisted in the transatlantic bomber ferry service were killed yesterday in a take-off crash in which twenty-two persons in all died, including the Rt. Hon. Arthur Purvis, chairman of the British Supply Council in North America.
The crash, announced by R. A. F. ferry command today, followed an almost identical ferry service accident Sunday in which another twenty-two were killed, making the week's toll fourty-four lives, including those of nineteen American.

Burst into Flames:
Not a man escaped yesterday's accident. The big plane, which was taking the Americans back to America in a group so that they could fly more new bombers back to Britain, burst into flames immediately on crashing.
Among the American victims was Captain Joseph Creighton Mackey, 33, of Kansas City, who was the lone survivor of a crash in Newfoundland last February in which Sir Frederick Benting, co-discover of insulin, and two others were killed.
List of Dead
The dead included nine Canadians, among them Purvis, and one Englishman. Eleven of the Americans were pilots, and one was a radio operator. Seven of the Canadians were radio operators, one was a pilot.
The victims were listed as follows:
Capt. Joseph C. Mackey, Kansas City.
Capt. A. C. Earl, Huntington, W.Va.
Capt. M. D Dilley, Kansas City.
Capt. J. J. Kerwin, Oakland, Calif.
Capt. E. B. Anding, Merrick, N.Y.
Capt. M. J. Wetzel, Jamesburg, N.Y.
Captain Gerald Hull
, Royal Oak, Mich.
Capt. E. Hamel, Braintree, Mass.
Capt. P. F. Lee, Jr, Frederick, Md.
Flying Officer W. L. Trimble, Fort Worth, Tex.
Flying Officer E. W. Watson, Torrence, Calif.
Flight Engineer R. F. Davis, Seattle, Wash.
Other Victims
Rt. Hon. Arthur P. Purvis, Montreal.
Capt. J. J. Moffat, Toronto.
Radio Operator R. Coates, Yarmouth, N.S.
Radio Operator W. F. J. Goddard, Toronto.
Radio Operator R. A. Duncan, Port Arthur, Ontario.
Radio Operator A. Tamlin, Port Arthur, Ontario.
Radio Operator D. N. Hannant, Victoria, B.C.
Radio Operator J. P. Culbert, Montreal.
Capt. R. C. Stafford, Maidenhead, Berks, England.
Radio Operator J. J. Macdonald, Longeuil, Quebec.

Was Clear Of Field
Captain Harold Balfour, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Air, flew to the scene of the crash this morning.
The plane was clear of the field on its takeoff, but suddenly lost altitude, it was reported. At the edge of the field is [sic] plowed into a raised road, skittered through a fence and burst into flames. Wreckage was scattered over a considerable area and airmen and soldiers who ran to the scene with fire-fighting apparatus were held off by intense heat and smoke.

Other American citizens killed in crash interred at Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial are:

ROLAND FOLFORD DAVIS, Flight Engineer
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot C. Row 0. Grave 15.

MURRAY BENJAMIN DILLEY,(Jnr.), Captain
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot G. Row 2. Grave 158.

ALTON CHESTER EARLE, Captain
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot G. Row 2. Grave 155.

ELBERT BEARD ANDING,First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 6. Grave 2.

GERALD HULL, Captain
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot C. Row 0. Grave 2.

PHILIP FRANCIS LEE,First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 4. Grave 162

WALTER LEE TRIMBLE,First Officer
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot E. Row 0. Grave 92.

EARL WELLINGTON WATSON ,First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 5. Grave 161.

MARTIN JOSEPH WETZEL, First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 3. Grave 156.



Casualty of WWII, he was one of 15 American citizens who died while serving with the RAF Ferry command or Air Transport Auxiliary, and who are commemorated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.He was a First Officer
with the Air Transport Auxiliary-Flight Captain, U.S. Army Air Forces-Royal Air Force Ferry Command.

He entered the service from Mississippi.

The victims of this tragedy are commemorated, though not by name, on a special memorial in Ayr Cemetery where many of the British and Canadian airmen are interred.The memorial was erected as a result of a subscription by the inhabitants of Whitletts as a token of respect.

He was a member of the Lee family of Virginia/Maryland.
His family went to Mississippi when Philip left for the UK.

Washington Post front page story on 8/16/1941:
Captain Lee, British Crash Victim, Was Scion of Old Md. Family:



Special Dispatch to the post
Frederick, Md., Aug. 15.
Captain Philip F. Lee, Jr. 34, of Urbana, Md., ferry pilot for the British, who was killed in yesterday's airliner crash in England, went to Canada last September to join the Canadian Air Force.
He had been flying for ten years and was the son of Philip F. Lee, Sr., Vice President of the U. S. Fidelity & Guaranty Co., Baltimore, and a brother of J. Tyson Lee, member of Maryland's House of Delegates.
His wife and a 5-year-old daughter, a brother, Augustus W. Lee, Pittsburg, and a sister, Miss Georgine Lee, Urbana, also survive.Captain Lee worked for the U. S. Fidelity & Guaranty Co. before going to Canada and had lived with their parents at their home, Sugarloaf Farm, near Urbana.
He was a member of a family prominent in Maryland since colonial days.During the last Ohio Valley flood, Captain Lee used his plane to fly refugees out of danger areas and to bring in supplies. Last spring he started to ferry planes across the ocean. While he was on this side of the Atlantic he maintained a home with his wife and daughter in Montreal.Captain Lee was born in Baltimore December 14, 1905. He was educated in the public school at Urbana, in Honolulu and at the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, from which he was graduated. While at Polytechnic he was a South Atlantic swimming champion. He studied mechanical engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
The Lee family settled in Frederick County in colonial days and the family seat, Needwood, near Burkettsville, is still owned by a branch of the family.Captain Lee was a descendant of Thomas Sim Lee, Governor of Maryland from 1779 to 1782 and from 1792 to 1794.

The Baltimore Evening Sun ran a similar front page story on the 15th:
MARYLAND PILOT, 11 OTHERS FROM U.S. KILLED IN BRITAIN
Ferry Bomber Falls After Taking Off;
Purvis is Victim
[By the Associated Press]
London, Aug. 15.
Twelve American Flyers enlisted in the transatlantic bomber ferry service were killed yesterday in a take-off crash in which twenty-two persons in all died, including the Rt. Hon. Arthur Purvis, chairman of the British Supply Council in North America.
The crash, announced by R. A. F. ferry command today, followed an almost identical ferry service accident Sunday in which another twenty-two were killed, making the week's toll fourty-four lives, including those of nineteen American.

Burst into Flames:
Not a man escaped yesterday's accident. The big plane, which was taking the Americans back to America in a group so that they could fly more new bombers back to Britain, burst into flames immediately on crashing.
Among the American victims was Captain Joseph Creighton Mackey, 33, of Kansas City, who was the lone survivor of a crash in Newfoundland last February in which Sir Frederick Benting, co-discover of insulin, and two others were killed.
List of Dead
The dead included nine Canadians, among them Purvis, and one Englishman. Eleven of the Americans were pilots, and one was a radio operator. Seven of the Canadians were radio operators, one was a pilot.
The victims were listed as follows:
Capt. Joseph C. Mackey, Kansas City.
Capt. A. C. Earl, Huntington, W.Va.
Capt. M. D Dilley, Kansas City.
Capt. J. J. Kerwin, Oakland, Calif.
Capt. E. B. Anding, Merrick, N.Y.
Capt. M. J. Wetzel, Jamesburg, N.Y.
Captain Gerald Hull
, Royal Oak, Mich.
Capt. E. Hamel, Braintree, Mass.
Capt. P. F. Lee, Jr, Frederick, Md.
Flying Officer W. L. Trimble, Fort Worth, Tex.
Flying Officer E. W. Watson, Torrence, Calif.
Flight Engineer R. F. Davis, Seattle, Wash.
Other Victims
Rt. Hon. Arthur P. Purvis, Montreal.
Capt. J. J. Moffat, Toronto.
Radio Operator R. Coates, Yarmouth, N.S.
Radio Operator W. F. J. Goddard, Toronto.
Radio Operator R. A. Duncan, Port Arthur, Ontario.
Radio Operator A. Tamlin, Port Arthur, Ontario.
Radio Operator D. N. Hannant, Victoria, B.C.
Radio Operator J. P. Culbert, Montreal.
Capt. R. C. Stafford, Maidenhead, Berks, England.
Radio Operator J. J. Macdonald, Longeuil, Quebec.

Was Clear Of Field
Captain Harold Balfour, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Air, flew to the scene of the crash this morning.
The plane was clear of the field on its takeoff, but suddenly lost altitude, it was reported. At the edge of the field is [sic] plowed into a raised road, skittered through a fence and burst into flames. Wreckage was scattered over a considerable area and airmen and soldiers who ran to the scene with fire-fighting apparatus were held off by intense heat and smoke.

Other American citizens killed in crash interred at Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial are:

ROLAND FOLFORD DAVIS, Flight Engineer
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot C. Row 0. Grave 15.

MURRAY BENJAMIN DILLEY,(Jnr.), Captain
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot G. Row 2. Grave 158.

ALTON CHESTER EARLE, Captain
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot G. Row 2. Grave 155.

ELBERT BEARD ANDING,First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 6. Grave 2.

GERALD HULL, Captain
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot C. Row 0. Grave 2.

PHILIP FRANCIS LEE,First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 4. Grave 162

WALTER LEE TRIMBLE,First Officer
Royal Air Force Ferry Command
Plot E. Row 0. Grave 92.

EARL WELLINGTON WATSON ,First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 5. Grave 161.

MARTIN JOSEPH WETZEL, First Officer
Air Transport Auxiliary
Plot G. Row 3. Grave 156.





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  • Maintained by: stevenkh1
  • Originally Created by: War Graves
  • Added: Aug 6, 2010
  • Find a Grave Memorial ID:
  • Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/56287250/philip_francis-lee: accessed ), memorial page for Capt Philip Francis Lee Jr. (15 Dec 1905–14 Aug 1941), Find a Grave Memorial ID 56287250, citing Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial, Coton, South Cambridgeshire District, Cambridgeshire, England; Maintained by stevenkh1 (contributor 47175148).