2023 passion project:

I'm part of a small dedicated team in the UK and US honoring and remembering the 13 young American airmen and 4 British civilian road workers killed in a B-17 Pathfinder crash. "Stinky" was the first American aircraft to be equipped with secret H2S radar from the British. Allowed the lead Pathfinder to drop incendiary bombs with more accuracy for bombers to follow up from behind even under cloud coverage. BTO =' Bombing Through Overcast. A fire and fatal crash occurred in Brome (Suffolk County) after takeoff at low altitude from Thorpe Abbotts airbase en route to Alconbury their home station on November 10, 1943. The Oaksmere Hotel closely borders, the crash site and generously offered a key location for the memorial to be placed.

On November 10th the 80th anniversary of the tragic crash a permanent memorial was dedicated and blessed with family of some of the fallen in attendance and participating in the service. My father's stories about his friend Jack inspired my research since December 2015 that led me on a journey to learn more about the crash and the copilot (his childhood friend). I have quite a number of his letters sent to my grandparents and my father in the early 1940s. These letters were a window into the past and showed me the close friendship between my family and Jack Russell.

Grateful for the support that we received! Twice the number of people attended, and everything fell into place beautifully and respectfully.

We hope to locate other family of the 17 and share our research, photos and the 49 page booklet written to tell their stories and the history surrounding this tragic incident.

I have a virtual cemetery on my profile for the 17 fallen. I manage 10 of them as follows:

4 British civilians:

Ernest Hugh Barker, Charles Burridge, Walter Clarke and William Dixon.

6 American airmen:

Andrew Jack Allison, Evans, Herman Koulosek, John Duvall May, Sheldon Vernon McCormick, John "Jack" Russell.

Please contact me for more details. Please see project description on the GFM link on my profile.

Questions, research help and enquiries welcome! Thank you kindly.

———-

Active member. I caught the genealogy bug spring of 2010. I am a very curious person and love learning about local history, customs, geography and a host of other topics that genealogy offers. Historical events are more fascinating when you're learning about it from a personal perspective.

PHOTOS

Please feel free to use any photographs that I have taken or shared for your family history archive, but give photo credit to "Find A Grave Contributor arborvitae #47298569" and note if any provenance given by me.

If you come across someone that you're directly or distantly related to on my page, PLEASE do write me a message. We just might be able to share some helpful information with each other.

ERRORS

If you notice that I have made a mistake or an omission, PLEASE do let me know and if possible give me your source.

EDITS

PLEASE DON'T ADD BIO EDITS TO THE FLOWER SECTION. Submit this information via the EDIT tab feature. I am very responsive to edits and updates and usually take less than a week to research and add updates I receive. I highly recommend that you send any bio corrections through the Find A Grave EDIT tab.

Find A Grave allows 30 days for edit updates to be approved. Sometimes Find A Gravers are inactive or unresponsive for a number of reasons. If you leave bio updates on someone's wall, firstly it is more cumbersome for the other person especially if they manage thousands of memorials AND you will not be able to remember and follow up on your request!

GRATITUDE

Many thanks to the volunteers on Find A Grave who have helped me along the way with either a photograph, cemetery readings that led me to locate family or a local archive look up. Paying it forward! Everyone has a vital role on Find A Grave and mine is maintaining and updating memorials that I have added for direct and very distant kin and families by marriage of my cousins as well as those I come across and figure out I am not related. It is hard for me to just let good data go to the wayside without sharing it by adding a memorial to this site. If I see families are not linked up, I will take the time to do so even if I am not related.

More about details/content than numbers. All types of volunteer work on here is needed and appreciated!

FLOWERS

PLEASE NOTE: I greatly appreciate when others leave flowers on my memorials especially related descendants! I prefer simple, conservative flowers/images etc. especially for the older graves. No flashy gifs. Thank you kindly for your understanding.

Edited: July 27, 2026.