|
|
|
7th June 1944On this day:
If you can provide any additional information, please add it here.
|
Remembering those who died this day.
- Blackburn Edward. Pte. (d.7th June 1944)
- Corns Harry Ashley. WO. (d.7th Jun 1944)
- Ellis Henry William. F/O. (d.7th Jun 1944)
- Kearton Albert. Pte (d. 7th June 1944)
- Martin-Leake Stephen Philip. Major (d.7th June 1944)
- Purser Richard Lydmar Moline. Capt. (d.7th June 1944)
- Tribe Kenneth. Cpl. (d.7th June 1944)
- Wyand Guy Herbert. F/O. (d.7th Jun 1944)
The names on this list have been submitted by relatives, friends, neighbours and others who wish to remember them, if you have any names to add or any recollections or photos of those listed,
please
Add a Name to this List
|
|
|
The Wartime Memories Project is the original WW1 and WW2 commemoration website.
Announcements
- The Wartime Memories Project has been running for 24 years. If you would like to support us, a donation, no matter how small, would be much appreciated, annually we need to raise enough funds to pay for our web hosting and admin or this site will vanish from the web.
- 22nd April 2024 - Please note we currently have a huge backlog of submitted material, our volunteers are working through this as quickly as possible and all names, stories and photos will be added to the site. If you have already submitted a story to the site and your UID reference number is higher than 263973 your information is still in the queue, please do not resubmit, we are working through them as quickly as possible.
- Looking for help with Family History Research?
Please read our Family History FAQ's
- The free to access section of The Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers and funded by donations from our visitors. If the information here has been helpful or you have enjoyed reaching the stories please conside making a donation, no matter how small, would be much appreciated, annually we need to raise enough funds to pay for our web hosting or this site will vanish from the web.
If you enjoy this site
please consider making a donation.
Want to find out more about your relative's service? Want to know what life was like during the War? Our
Library contains an ever growing number diary entries, personal letters and other documents, most transcribed into plain text. |
|
We are now on Facebook. Like this page to receive our updates.
If you have a general question please post it on our Facebook page.
Wanted: Digital copies of Group photographs, Scrapbooks, Autograph books, photo albums, newspaper clippings, letters, postcards and ephemera relating to WW2. We would like to obtain digital copies of any documents or photographs relating to WW2 you may have at home. If you have any unwanted
photographs, documents or items from the First or Second World War, please do not destroy them.
The Wartime Memories Project will give them a good home and ensure that they are used for educational purposes. Please get in touch for the postal address, do not sent them to our PO Box as packages are not accepted.
World War 1 One ww1 wwII second 1939 1945 battalion
Did you know? We also have a section on The Great War. and a
Timecapsule to preserve stories from other conflicts for future generations.
|
|
Want to know more about the 7th of June 1944? There are:139 items tagged 7th of June 1944 available in our Library
These include information on officers, regimental histories, letters, diary entries, personal accounts and information about actions during the Second World War. |
|
Stories from 7th June 1944
|
Sandi Conti. US Army, 834th Engineer Aviation Battalion . I am a veteran of the 834th Engineer Aviation Battalion which built
the Matching Green Airfield. I spent two years on building Matching
Green. We left Matching in the Spring of 1944 for intensive training
for D-Day. On D-Day we were in front of Omaha Beach . We made several
attempts at landing, all unsuccessful. We attracted enemy fire which
knocked out an engine on our Rhino Ferry. Landing was now out of the
question since our outboard motors were used for steering as well as
for propulsion. With only one motor operational we could not move in
a straight line. So we could not attempt to go through a cleared
mine field. We were sitting ducks for enemy artillery. The navy
pulled us away from the beach and back to the troopship area. The
vehicles and equipment on the Rhino were transferred to another
landing craft and we finally landed at Saint Laurent sur Mer on D+1. Sandy Conti
|
Flying Officer William Lachlan McGown. DFC and Bar RAF, 514 Squadron, 162 Squadron. Flying Officer William Lachlan McGown was pilot of Lancaster DS822 of 514 Squadron that came down at Le Celles Les Bordes in France on the night of 7th of June 1944. He parachuted down along with 3 colleagues and evaded capture. My wife's cousin flew with him on the fateful night when the Lancaster came down. He too was killed and laid to rest in Le Celles Les Bordes. France with a further two colleagues. F/O McGown returned to Britain and moved onto 162 Squadron. I understand he left the RAF in 11th April 1946 and return to his native Scotland where he passed away in 1984 aged 70 years, a true hero. I would like to hear of anything from living relatives of his second crew at 162 Squadron. Sinclair T Ronald
|
Cpl. Reginald Leonard George Field. Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, . My dear father, Reginald Leonard George Field, now 86 years old, served with the REME for 4.5 years from 1942 to until 1946. He was just 18 when he was signed up. He was stationed in Yorkshire, France, Italy and Germany. He fought in the D-Day battle (D-Day +2) and landed on Omaha Beach - one of the few British regiments to land on that beach (most were American). He clearly remembers crawling up the beach on his belly, rifle on his back. We visited Omaha Beach last year. A young French lady in the Omaha Museum was gracious enough to take the time to thank my father for his part in liberating France. It was a proud moment. Caroline Parsons
|
F/O. Henry William Ellis. DFM. Royal Air Force, 29 Squadron. (d.7th Jun 1944) Harry Ellis was my Grandfather. He was shot down over France in June 1944 with his pilot Ronald Densham. They were flying a Mosquito which was buried (along with its occupants) by a local farmer to hide it from the Germans. When the war ended the farmer informed the British who recovered the remains which were then buried at Bayeaux in a joint grave. Harry left behind a wife, Joan, and three daughters under 5. We are always on the lookout for information about him and the internet has been a great help. Lucy Harris
|
Cpl. Kenneth Tribe. British Army, 256 Field Coy Royal Engineers. (d.7th June 1944) I began delving some years ago into my husband's family history and discovered that his mother, Marjorie, had been briefly married to Kenneth Tribe a WW2 soldier of the Royal Engineers. The marriage took place in Ardwick, Manchester in 1942 when Kenneth was only 22 and less than 2 years later he was dead.
Further research revealed that Corporal Tribe was part of the campaign in Italy and it was here in June 1944 that he and countless other young soldiers lost their lives. Kenneth is buried in Naples War Cemetery. Marjorie never talked about her first husband and went on to marry again.
Kenneth's mother, Mabel, was a widow and as far as I can find had no other children. One can only imagine the sorrow and anguish shared by a mother and a new bride. Marjorie kept nothing to remind her of her first husband not even a photograph and took her sorrow to the grave but his memory will always live on in the history of our family.
Linda Turner
|
Capt. Richard Lydmar Moline Purser. British Army, Dorsetshire Regiment. (d.7th June 1944) Dick Purser was an uncle I never knew, and about whom my father very seldom spoke. Born about 1911, he joined the army and was a captain in Dorset Regiment in Burma - presumably about the time of the battle of Kohima. A jingoistic newspaper report described him as generally 'Bagging a Jap before breakfast' but he was shot from an ambush, and died there.
Dick was raised in an army family; his father, Lydmar Moline Purser was a Surgeon Col. who lost a foot on the Somme - but his boot was found, and returned!. My grandmother received a telegram saying "Col Purser slightly injured." - well, it is all relative. He was permitted to stay in the army with only one leg, as he could still ride a horse!
Dick's elder brother, my father, William Alexander, was a Lt. Col. in the Royal Signals and retired in 1955 to sail for a living, and died in 1993; his much younger brother John Inglis Purser fought in Germany in the Royal Engineers and retired as a brigadier; he died in 2013.
Dick's family home was Bosham, near Chichester, and a family anecdote tells how he was bored one day and dug a 14ft deep hole in the garden for fun (I doubt the veracity of that, unless he dug very quickly, at low tide!). Before going overseas he married, but was divorced shortly afterwards.
Editor's Note: a search on Ancestry and the Internet shows that Dick was 26 when he died on 7th Jun 1944 and that he was actually born on 11 Jan 1918 in Woking, Surrey. He was the husband of Vera Florence Purser.
He enlisted in the Infantry and was in the Dorsetshire Regiment at the time of his death. He died of wounds on the Assam-Burma frontier. He is buried at the Imphal War Cemetery, Imphal, Manipur, India.
A link has been added to the following: "Captain Richard Lydmar Moline Purser, The Dorsetshire Regiment, Hill 1931 to 1936, was wounded in the head while leading a special "tough" guerilla platoon in an attack on Dyer Hill two miles south of Kohima. "He was absurdly brave," wrote the Battalion Chaplain. His Commanding Officer sent these further details. "When his Company Commander was wounded Dick took over, straightened out rather a nasty mess, handled the company magnificently and held this vital ground with a handful for several days."
Michael H Purser
|
Major Stephen Philip Martin-Leake. British Army, attd. Special Operations Executive Intelligence Corps. (d.7th June 1944) Major Stephen Philip Martin-Leake was 38 when he was killed in action in an air raid in Albania.
(Served as LEAKE). Son of the Revd. William Ralph Martin-Leake, M.A., and of F. Martin-Leake, of Godalming, Surrey. B.A., Scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. Alternative Commemoration - buried in Sheper. s flynn
|
Pte. Edward Blackburn. British Army, 12th Battalion (Yorkshire) Parachute Regiment. (d.7th June 1944) Edward Blackburn served with the Parachute Regiment. He is buried in Ranville Churchyard.
|
WO. Harry Ashley Corns. Royal Air Force, No.53 Squadron. (d.7th Jun 1944) My uncle, Harry Corns, was reported missing in action after failing to return from an operational flight on 7th of June 1944. The squadron formed part of Coastal Command based at St. Eval in Cornwall. It performed anti-submarine patrols and, as the date indicates, was supporting the D-Day landings. Even though no wreckage was found, the body of one of the crew washed up on the French coast. At his death, my uncle was 26 years old and had been married for only 3 weeks. Chris Corns
|
F/O. Guy Herbert Wyand. Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, No. 619 Squadron. (d.7th Jun 1944) From January to March 1944, Guy Wyand served as a rear gunner with No. 9 Squadron at RAF Bardney. He then volunteered with No. 619 Squadron on D-Day and was shot down and killed.
|
|
