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| Date: | Monday 20 November 1944 |
| Time: | 20:50 |
| Type: |  Vickers Wellington Mk X |
| Owner/operator: | 22 OTU RAF |
| Registration: | MF509 'OX-F' |
| MSN: | |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 6 / Occupants: 6 |
| Other fatalities: | 0 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed |
| Location: | Carreg Goch, Brecon Beacons, South Wales -
 United Kingdom
|
| Phase: | En route |
| Nature: | Military |
| Departure airport: | RAF Wellebourne Mounford, Warwickshire |
| Return. |
MF509, a VickersWellington MK10, took off from Stratford-Upon-Avon, satellite airfield to RAF Wellesbourne Mountford (22 Operational Training Unit) at 19.26 hours on Nov.20th 1944 for a night cross country navigation training exercise.
Shortly before 20.50 hrs the crew sent a radio message asking permission to go below cloud as they were having trouble with the starboard engine, perhaps due to icing in the carburetor. Permission was granted and as they descended over the mountains of the Brecon Beacons their aircraft flew into the South West slope of Carreg Goch. All six crewman were killed.
With the help of local people from Craig y Nos, the RAF rescue team reached the site that night and removed the bodies. The aircrew lost in the crash on Carreg Goch were:
PILOT Sgt CHARLES HAMEL
NAVIGATOR Sgt JULES ROBERT RENE VILLENEUVE
BOMB AIMER F/Off WILLIAM JOSEPH ALLISON
W/Op/AIR GUNNER Sgt JOSEPH PAUL ERNEST BURKE
AIR GUNNER Sgt ARTHUR GROUIX
AIR GUNNER Sgt GERARD DUSABLON
Details:
The Wellington went on to be built in 16 separate variants, in addition to two training conversions after the war. The number of Wellingtons built totalled 11,462 of all versions, a greater quantity produced than any other British bomber. On the 13th of October 1945, the last Wellington to be produced rolled out. The mark 10 being the greatest number of the type, with 3,803 aircraft built with two 1,615hp Bristol Hercules VI or XVI engines at Blackpool and Chester. MF509 was one unit built by Vickers at Blackpool and presented allocated straight to 22 OUT at Wellesbourne on the 25th of April 1944, she was issued the radio codes OX-F ‘Freddie’.
On the Monday afternoon of the 20th the crew of MF509, were briefed for a navigation exercise on another dull and wet day going into the evening. They took off from RAF Stratford at 19.26 hours to conduct the night-time cross country navigation training exercise along with two other Wellingtons, these were MF505 and LN460.
Shortly before 20.50 hrs They had flown into shower clouds and accumulated an ice layer. Unable to maintain height with this additional load and the Starboard engine causing problems with power, the crew sent a radio message asking permission to go below cloud as they were having problems maintaining height. Permission was granted.
As they descended over the mountains of the Brecon Beacons their aircraft flew into the Southwest slope of Carreg Goch and carrying on up the slight hill, breaking up along the way until finally coming to a stop and finally bursting into flames.
The alert was raised soon afterwards when the radio calls from control went unanswered. With the help of local people from Craig y Nos, the RAF rescue team reached the site that night to hopefully to rescue any survivors. Instead, all they could do was to recover the bodies.
Wreckage was spread over a wide area, with more in the rocks to the west and northwest and down slope. Over the coming days, the recovery crews recovered the sensitive equipment (if anything survived) and the guns. Two days later, on a visit to the wreckage site, Eric Price, a local from Ynesen, Wales, recovered an unidentified photo of a flier, which he incorporated into his family album where it was to remain for 61 years.
In 2005, the photograph of an airman, found at the site in 1944, was placed on the Internet in an effort to identify him. This stimulated co-operation between McGill University in Montreal, Canada and the people of the Swansea Valley. Only then, some 60 years later, did the families know the specific fate of their loved ones and of the plane. The crash site is in a remote and lonely spot, at about 520 metres above the upper Swansea Valley. In May 2006, a climb to the site, was undertaken by representatives from McGill University, surviving family members of the crew and people from the Swansea Valley.
All the crew were interred with full military honours, at the Canadian War Cemetery at Blacon, Chester, England. Wreckage is scattered over a wide area, with the main wheel being a very long way from the main site near the river Giedd. Until recently, the Canadian families of the crew, knew nothing of the circumstances or location of the crash, nor of the existence of the memorial plaque that now stands at Garreg Goch.
Crew:
P/O Charles Hamel 21yo J/92169 RCAF. Pilot. Killed. 1
Son of Dr Paul Hamel and of Bertha Ellen Hamel of Montreal, Province of Quebec, Canada.
Sgt Jules Robert Rene Villeneuve 22yo R/199834 RCAF. Navigator. Killed. 2
Son of Jean B. Villeneuve and Clara Villeneuve of Verdun, Province of Quebec, Canada.
F/Lt William Joseph Allison 28yo J/20861 RCAF. Bombardier. Killed. 3
Son of William Earle Allison and Mary Ruth Allison of Montreal, Province of Quebec, Canada.
Sgt Joseph Paul Ernest Burke 20yo R/206904 RCAF. W/Op-A/Gnr. Killed. 4
Son of William and Dorine Burke of West Bathurst, Gloucester County, New Brunswick, Canada.
Sgt Joseph Arthur Edmond Groulx 22yo R/111476 RCAF. A/Gnr. Killed. 5
Son of Arthur and Alexandrine Groulx of Hull, Province of Quebec, Canada.
Sgt Joseph Lionel Ulderic Gerard Du Sablon 20yo R/174038 RCAF. A/Gnr. Killed. 6
Son of Lionel Olivier and Mary Lea Du Sablon of De Gaspe, Montreal, Province of Quebec, Canada.
Buried.
1 Chester (Blacon) Cemetery. Section A. Grave 358.
2 Chester (Blacon) Cemetery. Section A. Grave 57.
3 Chester (Blacon) Cemetery. Section A. Grave 143.
4 Chester (Blacon) Cemetery. Section A. Grave 315.
5 Chester (Blacon) Cemetery. Section A. Grave 401.
6 Chester (Blacon) Cemetery. Section A. Grave 229.
Wreckage:
This crash site has the dubious honour of being well known due to the vast amount of wreckage that remains to this day. Also, the Geodetic structure make up of the Starboard wing clearly identifies it to be unmistakably a Wellington. Amongst the remains are easily recognised. Such as the exhaust collection ring from the Starboard engine and the wheel well. Up until the latter part of the eighties, the tail fin was extant on site, but recovered by the RAF and was on display hanging on a hanger wall of the Classic Allied and Axis collection at St Athan until the early 90’s, which had ‘Ground Running’ aircraft such as two mk.IX Spitfires, a Messerschmitt 410, Focke Wulf 190 and static aircraft including a Mosquito IV, Messerschmitt ‘Komet’. All these airframes were sent to RAF Museums at Cosford and London. As for the tail from MF509, this remains elusive as to its present whereabouts. Other recognisable relics at the site include, horizontal stabilizers, fuselage ribs and fuel tanks. Also, until the mid-90’s, one of the undercarriage wheel hubs was to be seen nearly half a mile downhill from the site.
If you walk along the wreckage trail, you will come upon an area Northwest by 100 yards a bolder field where within you’ll find Perspex and framing with numerous .303 exploded ammunition. This is where the rear turret came into contact with the rocks. Carrying on down the slight incline, you will come upon the first point of impact, here there lies more framing and Perspex as well as more .303 rounds, this is the area where the front turret hit. This crash site must have about 60% on site. The only parts which are obviously removed are, the two engines, propellers and the guns. Such is the remoteness of this site where six Canadians perished.
Memorials:
CWGC Headstones. Memorials on site. Canadian Museum Virtual Memorial web page and many more sites on the web commemorating their loss.
Additional Information:
RAF Atherstone, latterly RAF Stratford, was a satellite base for RAF Wellesbourne Mountford near Stratford-Upon-Avon in Warwickshire. It opened in 1941 as RAF Atherstone, being located next to the small hamlet of Atherstone-on-Stour and was a training facility used by the No.22 Operational Training Unit RAF. Its name changed to RAF Stratford in 1942 after the RAF realised nobody could find the sparsely populated parish, with no railway station, with the result being more than a few servicemen posted to the base mistakenly ended up at the much larger town of Atherstone 40 miles away near Tamworth.
MF509 was one of three Wellington bombers from 22 OTU lost that night, all with starboard engine problems.
Canadian pilot P/O Nezan managed to crash land Wellington MF505 at RAF Wellesbourne Mountford with none of the crew being injured.
Wellington LN460 had less luck. A fire broke out in the starboard engine nacelle which could not be extinguished. Three of the crew were able to bale out, but the 3 Canadian crewmen remaining went down with their aircraft which crashed in a huge explosion on farmland south of Evesham. They were.
Pilot Officer Duncan McKenzie Roy (Pilot) aged 29
Flight Sergeant Fred Knowles (Wireless op / Air Gunner) aged 23
Sergeant Alexander Angus Cameron (Air Gunner) aged 19.
The Search for the Identity of the Photo: (Text extract from https://www.archives.mcgill.ca).
“In 2005, Eric Price's granddaughter, Caroline Davies, began searching the web for the identity of the flier. She posted a request for assistance in identifying her grandfather's photo of the flier on Roots Chat history messaging forum. The brother of the air gunner, Ernest Burke, was located in New Brunswick. On the McGill Remembers website, Davies came across the name of William Allison, who had attended McGill in 1936, and was listed among McGill's war casualties. She contacted Professor Christopher Milligan of McGill University's Faculty of Education and Wes Cross of the Dean of Students Office, both part of McGill Remembers Project, for further information.
Upon learning that Allison had never married and had no children, Cross and Milligan felt they had reached an impasse until Milligan located the obituary of Allison's sister in the McGill University Archives. Noting that a sibling was married to a Pare and recalling that Professor Anthony Pare worked at McGill, Milligan contacted him and learned that one of Allison's siblings, Phyllis (Allison) Burns, was still alive. Further research ensued revealing that the photo was not that of William Allison but that the pilot, Charles Hamel, and the navigator, Jules Villeneuve, had received their training at McGill's air school.
Surviving family members of the crew members were contacted. They were all surprised to learn that not only did the crash site still exist, but that a memorial had been erected there. They had all assumed that the plane had crashed near Chester, England, the burial site of the crew.
Unfortunately, the identity of the airman in Eric Price's photo is still unknown. Due to his bout of air sickness, Gaston Caron, the crew's navigator, was replaced by Jules Villeneuve just prior to the crash. This explains why Caron figures in the crew photo and how he survived the war. It has been suggested that the photo is that of Caron, however, this has not been proven.”
Sources:
1. http://mf509.blogspot.co.uk/
2. http://www.thisissouthwales.co.uk/Wellington-bomber-MF509-crew-remembered-mountain/story-17329074-detail/story.html#axzz2VBYS198T
3. http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=662882
4. http://peakwreckhunters.blogspot.co.uk/2009/03/armstrong-vickers-wellington-mk-10.html
www.archives.mcgill.ca
www.28dayslater.co.uk
www.coflein.gov.uk
www.cwgc.org
www.lancasterbombers.net
www.findagrave.com
www.adventurebritain com
www.adventurebritain.com
www. lossesinternationalbcc.co.uk
caspir.warplanes.com
www.aircrashes.co.ujk
www.baesyatems.com
Media:
Revision history:
| Date/time | Contributor | Updates |
|---|---|---|
| 03-Jun-2013 20:05 | Dr. John Smith | Added |
| 27-Apr-2015 20:42 | Victor I | Updated [Aircraft type, Operator, Departure airport, ] |
| 23-Oct-2024 08:07 | Davies 62 | Updated [Registration, Destination airport, Source, Narrative, ] |
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