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Mosquito IV DK299 crash landed near Rejsby 11/7-1942.
The aircraft belonged to RAF 105 Sqn. Bomber Command and was coded GB-S.
T/O 17:31 Horsham. OP: Flensburg.
With two more Mosquitos DK299 crewed by Pilot F/Lt George P. Hughes MID and
Observer F/O Thomas A. Gabe were to form second wave in a attack on the U-boat
pens in Flensburg.
First wave completed their attack while second wave suffered
from poor weather, and GB-P turned back.
A Mosquito piloted by F/Sgt Rowland was
the target for flak over Sylt, and when he approached Emmebül, he hit a chimney.
A propeller blade had been bent and he had to slow down.
Hughes and Rowland
believed that they were over Germany and chose to attack a secondary target.
They choose Tønder rail way station in Denmark.
After the attack Rowland
returned to England on one engine.
DK299 followed the railroad to the north and
south of Skærbæk it attacked a train. The bombs hit the locomotive and killed
the driver while the stoker died from burns two days later.
Meanwhile a German
Bf 109G-1 fighter piloted by Unteroffizier Herbert Biermann of 2./JG 1 had
closed in behind the Mosquito and opened fire.
Apparently he dammaged it badly enough
to make Hughes try to crash land the aircraft south of Rejsby å (River) at
19:09.
The Mosquito skidded across the fields at high speed, crossed the river
and hit the opposite bank, and broke up.
(Marinearchiv T1022 R4296 via Martin Toft
Madsen)
This map shows the attack as seen by the German Marine and
the crash location of DK299 (in upper left corner)
(Peter Lund)
Pilot F/Lt George P. Hughes
When local people arrived and pulled
the flyers from the wreck one was dead while the other one was still breathing.
The police was called for and Constable Lassen arrived in a ambulance to take
the surviving flyer to the hospital in Ribe.
The flyer was however dead on
arrival. Hughes and Gabe were both laid to rest in Fovrfelt cemetery in Esbjerg
on 16/7-1942.
Pictures above: Germans dismantling the badly damaged Mosquito
Sources : CWGC. BE. LBUK. AS 65-72. RL 19/454+472. Peter Lund, Skærbæk
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