Monthly Bulletin May/June 2005 - Vol 8 No. 3

Deal Island Lighthouse Photo:  Winsome Bonham

Roy Cowling, RAAF Airman killed in Deal Island plane crash Photograph: courtesy RAAF

World War 2 plane crash on Deal Island

edited by Steve Merson, Chief Editor

Published in the October 2003 Bulletin was a letter written by Roy Cowling in February 1944, regarding an aircraft crash on Deal Island, Bass Strait. Roy's son, (also named Roy), was one of the four airmen who died in the crash. Following research at the National Archives of Australia (NAA) and in Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) records, David Weatherill has brought further information to light.

An Airspeed Oxford of 1 Operational Training Unit (OTU), Serial No., AS618 piloted by Flight Sergeant Joseph Docherty, and three crew members, took off from the East Sale RAAF Base on an operational training mission out over Bass Strait and Deal Island. At approximately 0935 hours on 23 September 1943, the aircraft crashed whilst investigating a shop in one of the inlets at Deal Island, and all four airmen on the aircraft were killed.

Pilot Officer Kenenth Roy COWLING [419605]
Born: Bendigo, Victoria; Aged: 20 years
Clerk with the State Electricity Commission, Bendigo
Enlisted: 9 September 1942; Single

Flight Sergeant Joseph DOCHERTY [411878] Pilot of aircraft
Born: Glasgow, Scotland; Aged: 28 years
Dairy Farmer
Enlisted: 21 June 1941; Single

Sergeant Normal Stirling GRAHAM [418504]
Born: Mandalay, Burma; Aged 21 years
Bank Clerk
Enlisted: 22 May 1942; Single

Sergeant Peter Albion HENDRICKSON [419937]
Born: Maryborough, Victoria; Aged 20 years
Mail Officer
Enlisted: 9 October 1942; Single

They were all attached to 1OTU. The WWII Service Files for the airmen have a military identification picture of each, with the exception of Norman Graham, as part of their Attestation Form.

Initially, the four airmen were buried on Deal Island, but they were then transferred to Springvale (Victoria) Cemetery, and reinterred in the military section.

In NAA reference P1113/0 Deal Island: Log Book 1945/1946, held at the Hobart Branch of the NAA, on the inside of the back cover, there is further information on these airmen. This information consisted of a rough drawing identifying the actual burial spot of the four airmen, in relation to the lighthouse tower, and a drawing showing the graves of the airmen, with notes as follows, listing the graves in order:

Further on the page, signed by H. Ford, Keeper, is:

The NAA in Canberra holds a copy of the Royal Australian Air Force Preliminary Report External of Flying. Accident or Forced Landing Report dated 29 September 1943, briefly outlining on one page details of the accident. This report can be found as Folio A9845 239. It is part of a larger group of reports detailing accidents to Airspeed Oxford Aircraft. This aircraft was known to many hundreds of RAF and RAAF aircrew as the "Oxbox".

The Oxford first appeared in 1937 and was a military development from the 1934 Envoy, and was the first twin-engined monoplane trainer in the Royal Air Force. The first Oxfords became part of the Central Flying School in November 1937 and by the time World War 2 started, nearly 400 were in service. As a trainer, the Oxford served in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Southern Rhodesia and the United Kingdom.

Joyce Westcott was 17 years old in 1943, and was told very little about the circumstances of her brother Roy's death. "It was a time when people kept things like that to themselves, and Roy's death was rarely spoken about again…. it was a closed book".

More than 60 years passed until Joyce read Joanna Murray-Smith's book Judgement Rock, set on Deal Island. Inspired to learn more about Roy's death, an internet search took Joyce and her family to the Lighthouses of Australia website, where they discovered her father's typed letter that had been sent to us by Tony Wark, whose great aunt and uncle were the Graham's the letter was addressed to. Tony had thought it may be of interest to lighthouse buffs. Last January, LoA Committee member Christian Bell arranged for Joyce and her husband Michael to sail from Port Albert to Deal Island on the yacht Vega to visit the crash site. The account of their visit was published in the Melbourne Age newspaper on 1 May 2005. Joyce Westcott, on a hill at Deal Island, inspects one of the engines from the RAAF plane in which her brother Roy and three other airmen were killed in 1943. Photograph: courtesy  Sandy Scheltema, The Age Joyce and Michael Westcott, above Squally Cove on Deal Island, head down to the plane wreckage ... "I can't think of a more serene and wonderful place," says Joyce. Photograph: courtesy  Sandy Scheltema, The Age At about the same time, LoA received a letter (see right) from Pat Bartlett in Queensland, who had read the article in the latest Prism newsletter (No. 2/2005). Her father, Harry Ford, was the lighthouse keeper who saw the plane go down. Pat was 12 years old at the time, and remembers her father building a cross as a memorial on the crash site. A photo of the cross was enclosed with her letter, so we forwarded it and a copy of the letter to Joyce - and so LoA Inc has assisted to put some pieces of the jigsaw together - for Joyce Westcott, and for our readers.

Pat Bartlett's letter to LoA Inc (edited) Dear Mr Merson, I was very interested in the article in the issue of the Prism about the plane crash on Deal Island. I lived there at the time, my father was the keeper who saw it go down and my sister Aileen Ford was doing the broadcast. I was about 12 at the time. After they removed the men to Melbourne, my Dad thought he would like to put a small memorial at the site, so he built a cross, put the boy's names on each corner of the cross and set it in concrete with a round hole in the side where a bottle could be slipped in and out with an account of what happened in 1943. Best wishes,  Pat Bartlett, nee Ford Memorial cross built by Lightkeeper Harry Ford in 1943 Photographer: Harry Ford

We thank David Weatherill for his exhaustive research and Christian Bell for his organisational skills. Foremost, we are grateful to the individuals who share their family history that relates to lighthouses.

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