Late on the evening of May 12, 1944, a four-engined Halifax bomber of 431 Squadron, Royal Canadian Air Force took off from its base at Croft, England. Its target that night, less than a month before the massive Allied invasion of D-Day, was the rail marshalling yards at Louvain, Belgium, just east of Brussels. Aboard were six Canadians of the RCAF and one Scottish member of the Royal Air Force. Shortly after midnight, the aircraft bombed the rail yards and began its journey back to England. It never returned. A German night fighter brought down the bomber south of Brussels, Belgium, killing six of its crew. Only the Belgian/Canadian Navigator Cyrile Barzeele baled out, was hidden by the Resistance and eventually was returned to England in Sept 1944. His six fellow crew members are buried in the Brussels Town Cemetery.
The crew of Halifax MZ629 - Bellow, Fl/O Preston who don't appear on the upper pictures
(Pictures from In Memories)
Taken at 1666 Heavy Conversion Unit, Halifax Bomber “Ferdinand”. Laturnus, Campbell, MacPherson, Preston, Barzeele, MacDermott (?? who trained with the crew but left prior to joining 431 Squadron), Empey
