My Great Uncle: Sgt Sid Thompson: Royal Air Force

[Adrian Stevenson]

The second telegram.

[Adrian Stevenson]

The letter from the Wing Commander. You can see how the family might just cling onto a little bit of hope?

[Bodace]

Ten letters to to ten familys for the loss of one aircraft.

That has to be one of the worst jobs a man can be asked to do

[ace]

I'm so sorry for your familys loss this country doesnt seem to have any type of commitee or group that can go looking for our lost fallen, everywhere else seems to but never once have I heard of a English group going to find our missing heros? I think it's wrong, it would be nice to know if we could bring home some of our fallen heros like all the other countrys do?

[Adrian Stevenson]

Hi Ace, thanks for your comments. Even though I never knew Sid I often think about him.

There are certain laws regarding British war dead.

Crashed aircraft which contain the remains of the aircrew cannot be excvated without a special licence in order to protect what is a War Grave.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commitee do a pretty good job:

:: CWGC ::

Cheers, Ade.

[barryb]

Great thread! I've recently just started looking for details of two of my family who were in the RAF Volunteer Reserve that were killed. I sent a letter out to the RAF dept who handle service records last week, but who knows what obstacles they'll throw in my way in the way of "next of kin" regulations etc.
How would you know if medals were claimed at the time? If you applied with the usual form would they tell you as such? Isn't there also another source for RAF details other than the service records - I read something about a squadron operations book..?

[Adrian Stevenson]

Hi Barry, thanks for your comment.

Good luck with your applications. Keep us posted here. They will be able to tell you if the medals were claimed (at the time or later on) if you try and apply for them as nearest living next of kin. One thing I can tell you is they destroy the records after a year or so of who actually claimed them.

"Operational Record books" are held by former Public Records Office, now called the "National Archives" at Kew in London.

The National Archives

These record the day to day operations carried out by the unit. The detail on these forms can vary somewhat according to how dilligent the Officer who filled them out was These records are only available on mircro film. So you will have to make a trip to Kew, or employ a researcher to do this for you. By trawling these you will find what Op's your relatives took part in, aircraft type, other crew members names etc. Well worth doing. I fully intend to find out what other flights Sid and the rest of the crew made.

| The National Archives

Cheers, Ade.

[OKW]

Hi, as your Great Uncle was on an operational training flight when lost does he not meet the requirements for the award of the 1939-45 star and possibly the Air Crew Europe star also?

[Adrian Stevenson]

Hi, as I mentioned earlier I honestly think he should have been awarded the 1939- 45 Star due to being killed on active service? But he would not have qualified for an Air Crew Europe Star.

Have a read of here:

The Official 1945 Statement regarding the British WW2 Campaign Stars and Defence Medal

Cheers, Ade.

[Steven M]

Great post Ade...Sid would be proud!