Crash Site Avro Lancaster Mk I HK542

This is a memorial to the 7 members of the flight crew of Lancaster bomber HK 542 of No 115 Squadron RAF who all perished in the early hours of the 25th April 1944.

21 Aircraft of 115 Squadron took off from their home base of RAF Witchford, Cambridgeshire between the hours of 21.48 and 22.19 on the night of the 24th April 1944 on a mission to bomb Karlsruhe. In total the mission was made up of 637 aircraft, comprising 369 Lancasters,259 Halifaxes and 9 Mosquitos.Cloud cover and strong winds pushed the pathfinder aircraft to the north of the target ,and so only the northern part of the town took significant damage, along with other towns further north hit as targets of opportunity.

Lancaster HK 542 call sign "KO-J " was intercepted by Heinz Wolfgang Schnaufer at 2.03 on the 25th April 1944 and the Lancaster crashed near the then Dompass Castle .This was the German night fighter's 54th kill and the bomber came down 9km north east of his former airbase town of St Truiden. Schnaufer the greatest night fighter ace of all time ,at the time group commander of IV/NG 1 based in Leeuwarden in the Netherlands made a further 3 victories on the 25th ,one of which was fellow 115 Squadron Lancaster Mk 2 aircraft DS 734 (KO-Y) brought down near Mechelen at 2.28 am.

Another one of Schnaufer's victims Halifax HX334 ,with its crash memorial can be found nearby in the Bokrijk area of Genk.Schnaufer went on to make 121 victories using the Messerschmitt Bf 110 who's his aircraft's two tailfins with all the kill symbols can be found at the Imperial War Museum and at the Australian War Memorial.

The aircrew of HK542 all perished at the time of the crash ,the pilot still in his seat and the others lay in field or hanging from trees.They were all originally buried at the Brustem airfield, St Truiden ,but now all have their final resting place together in the CWGC in Heverlee near Leuven.

They are:
Flight Sergeant. Peter Bennett, pilot RAFVR age 20 from Frilford ,Berkshire
Flying Officer .Adolf Hoffman ,navigator RAAF age 21 from Brisbane ,Australia
Sergeant. James Zegarchuk, bomb aimer RCAF age 22 from Vancouver, Canada
Sergeant. Norman Forth,wireless operator/air gunner RAFVR age 22 from Blackpool,Lancashire.
Sergeant. William McKelvie,rear gunner RAFVR age 24 from Cambuslang,Scotland.
Sergeant. John Plummer, flight engineer RAFVR age 19 from Bristol
Sergeant .Alan Holt ,mid upper gunner RAFVR age 20 from Stockport ,Cheshire

The memorial was unveiled just over 75 years after the fatal crash on the 4th May 2019 .It was created with the help of the Belgian Friends of 115 Squadron and was designed by Dan Jonkers of Mechelen.It is formed of a sort of bench with solid steel plates at each end placed vertically to represent the tail plane of a Lancaster ,with column in the centre with the names of the crew who all perished.

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Source

• Text: Ian Paterson
• Photos: Ian Paterson
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-zMvwEREVY
• Version with English subtitles : https://www.facebook.com/115squadron/videos/121827982964257
• https://www.hangarflying.eu/erfgoedsites/gedenkteken-voor-de-bemanning-van-lancaster-i-hk542-ko-j-115-sqn/
• http://aircrewremembered.com/bennett-peter-anthony.html