Crew: Seward

Seward - Seward 1942
Phil Seward, the pilot, 1942

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LANCASTER – LM323 OF-U

Shot down by a night fighter on 29th June 1943; the entire crew was killed.

CREW
Pilot:  Frederick Phillip Seward
Flight Engineer: Brynley Edmond Lewis
Navigator: Eric Sanderson
Bomb Aimer: Ernest Edward Lawton
W/Op: Kenneth Ivor Smith
Mid-Upper Gunner: Albert Monaghan
Rear gunner: Malcolm David Horner

 

 

Seward - Uncle Phil & Auntie Kay
Phil and Kay, both serving in the RAF

Above: another photograph of Seward, a delightful photograph showing him with his wife Kay, who was in the WAAFs. This is a very unusual double portrait of a husband and wife in uniform, both of whom were serving in the RAF.

It is Kay who is referred to in the dedication speech for the memorial below: “I must, however, tell you that F/Lt Seward’s wife, who was serving in the RAF, said good-bye to her husband only [2 hours and] 30 minutes before the crash […]”.

Both photographs courtesy of Aimee Jones, niece

 

Seward - Eric SandersonEric Sanderson, the Navigator 

The phSeward - Eric Sanderson 2otographs of Eric Sanderson and the following material were sent by Eric Sanderson’s son, Sandy, and his neighbour, John Woodhead, who was instrumental in putting Sandy in touch with this website. 
 Seward -Eric Sanderson wedding

 

DETAILS
Seward’s aircraft was shot down at twenty past one in the morning, having left Bourn just before eleven o’clock that night. The wreckage and bodies fell in the woods at Solwaster, Belgium, and very close to the anniversary of the crash in 1954 a most beautiful memorial was unveiled there to the lost crew.
Seward -monument 2wSeward - Memorial at SolwasterSeward - Memorial at Solwaster 03.IMG_5044
The main speech made at the dedication ceremony, by a local Belgium dignitary who all too vividly remembered the horrors of the war, contained the following very moving passages:
“At 20 past one in the starlit early hours of Tuesday, 29th June, 1943, in this place, impressive in its wildness, a Lancaster bomber crashed, carrying with it to their deaths the entire crew […]It is not necessary for me to give you the whole story as told by those villagers of Sart who discovered the wreckage. I must, however, tell you that F/Lt Seward’s wife, who was serving in the RAF, said good-bye to her husband only [2 hours and] 30 minutes before the crash.
You (airmen) took off from your not far-distant island, together with hundreds more of your comrades, to come and destroy the offensive might of a powerful and cruel foe, who, for three long years, had held in subjection Belgium, and the whole of Western Europe. But, also on that fateful night, 29th June 1943, your fine aircraft was forced out of that cloud of bombers sweeping towards their appointed targets, by a frightful explosion; its scattered wreckage fell in this place where we are now gathered together. All the inhabitants of the commune will remember that tragic night. Long before it was over, the crash of your aircraft was revenged by one of those mighty bombardments which time and time again turned the industrial Ruhr into a veritable inferno. We stood, as we had stood before, at our windows, scanning the blazing horizon, tasting to the full the joy of seeing the enemy paying a hundredfold for the sufferings he had inflicted on our beloved country. And soon the steady roar of engines was heard again, as the aircraft, relieved of their loads, returned at speed to their bases.
But you, our gallant friends, were unhappily not permitted on that night to savour the joys of a triumphant return home, your dangerous job well done. You had fallen on friendly soil. From sunrise on that first day and for many days thereafter this sad spot was thronged with sorrowing people who had come to pay their tribute to you, our friends and our defenders.The dark shadow of these woods, where death had stalked, served but to inflame anew our hatred of the enemy, who, before such a show of sympathy with you, fliers of an ally, was rendered powerless. We all know that many people from the commune of Sart have jealously preserved, as keepsakes, small pieces of your Lancaster, lasting evidence of that struggle which was pursued so relentlessly and which was bound to lead to eventual total victory …”
FROM THE ORB     28.6.43        Some beam flying and tests during morning.  14 aircraft detailed for ops.  1 aircraft abandoned mission – Sgt Montgomery – CS Unit of port outer u/s.  Target was Cologne.  Mainly 10/10ths cloud and bombing was carried out by means of sky markers.  Glow of fires seen through cloud.  1 aircraft failed to return – F/L Seward – no news received since aircraft left base.
LM323U  F/L F.P.Seward, Sgt B.E.Lewis, F/L E.Sanderson, F/O E.E.Lawton, F/Sgt K.I.Smith, Sgts A.Monaghan, M.D.Horner.  1 x 4000lb 12 SBC.  Up 2251.  Aircraft and crew missing.

 

Extract from Bomber Command Losses – 28/29.6.43
Lancaster III  LM323  OF – U.  Op Cologne.  T/O 2251 Bourn.  Shot down by a night fighter (Lt Heinz-Wolfgang Schnaufer, II/NJG1) crashing 0130 at Solwaster (Liege) and on the western side of the Hautes Fagnes 12km SE of Verviers.  Taken first to St-Truiden, their graves are now in Heverlee War Cemetery.
F/L F.P.Seward(+), Sgt B.E.Lewis(+), F/O E.Sanderson(+), F/O E.E.Lawton(+), F/S K.I.Smith(+),Sgt A.Monaghan(+), Sgt M.D.Horner(+).