Flight-Lt Kenneth R. Waugh of 97 Squadron was the skipper of Lancaster ND500G (OF-G) which was hit by flak, still with 103 incendiaries on board, near Munich at approximately 1.40 a.m. on April 25th 1944. Kenneth R. Waugh is my only uncle, whom of course I never met.
Kenneth, his 19 year-old Engineer Sergeant G.C. Munton, 24 year-old Navigator Flight-Officer R.C. Wickens, 22 year old Gunner Sergeant H. Stewart, 22 year-old Radio Operator Sgt W.E. Alexander and 37 year-old Gunner Flight-Officer R.D. Carter. Bomb-Aimer Flight-Officer G.H. Tulloch was the only one able to bail out and survive, to be interned in Stalagluft 3 until the end of the war.
In the few records I've found on the web, Ken is identified as an "American" from Virginia, or some sort of colonial as it were, from Sao Paulo, Brazil. Ken was in fact born in Sao Paulo in 1919, the eldest son of the English-born Governor of The Bank of London and South America, Norman Frederick Waugh and his American-born wife Bessie, of Morgantown, West Virginia, hence the confusion. Ken enjoyed a very privileged and exotic childhood as did his 11-months younger brother Richard, in Brazil, and a far less exotic but still privileged education at Blundells Boy's School in Devon as did his younger brother.
When Britain declared it was at war Ken and Richard both volunteered for the RAF to become pilots. Less than perfect vision kept Richard out of a pilot's seat so he had to settle for ground operations, but Ken was deemed fit for pilot training.
Unfortunately, I have not been able to find anything about Ken's early RAFVR record and just as unfortunately I have not been able to find out anything about the crew members of ND-500 G beyond their names but I have learned some of the arc of Ken's wartime life. Having joined-up at the outbreak of war with no flying experience at all I assume Ken would have spent his first couple of years in basic military training, officer training and flight training with the full course of flight training being frequently interrupted by bad weather and general wartime interruptions.
In 1942 Ken was assigned to take part in the Arnold Scheme in the US which provided Britain the means to train pilots and crews in the wide-open balmy skies of the US without interference from Luftwaffe harassment. Ken was placed in Class SE-42-C the third inducted class of 1942 in the American South East, assigned to Lakeland Florida in a training course run by the USAAC (later to become the USAAF). As a result of the American management of the program at Lakeland, Ken earned USAAC wings despite being in the RAFVR, but having done so he was retained as a 'check pilot' for ensuing classes of British pilot and aircrew cadets.
Ken also earned the love of a gorgeous local girl, Jean Ridgely. They married in Florida and when Ken was finally ordered back to England in late 1943, Jean followed Ken across the Atlantic in the US Coast Guard cutter Tamaroa and upon arrival in England, joined the WAAF.
Again I've discovered nothing of Ken's activities at this time. I can only assume he was engaged in some conversion training. From his time as an Arnold Scheme cadet and then check-pilot/instructor he must have accumulated 1,000 hours or more of flight time, but given that the Path Finder Force tended to recruit from exemplary combat-experienced personnel, I wonder if Ken had served with some other active squadron before joining or being acquired by 97 Squadron.
When the crew of ND500G was shot down on the Munich raid of April 24/25 1944, Ken's wife Jean had just learned that she was pregnant. Jean was discharged from the WAAF because of her condtion but stayed in Lonodon until after VE Day, whereupon she returned to the US with her infant daughter named Barbara. Shortly thereafter Jean met and married an American, Paul Hardaker.
Like thousands of others Ken didn't earn any distinctions of skill, fortitude or heroism, which rather highlights how heroic those who did earn such distinctions were, and perversely, perhaps, how heroic too were those whose acts and experiences did not single them out, such were the high standards set by all during that war.
Ken's younger brother Richard (my father) once took a ride, against regulations, in the dickey seat of a Wellington on an 'Op' and recounted to me that he'd never been so scared in his life, a change of trousers was apropos, as he put it. Richard survived the war, initially serving in England, then North Africa, Italy, France and Germany.
As frustrated as I am at having found so little about my uncle's wartime career, I am equally frustrated that I have found out even less about the crew of ND-500G. On the other hand, I am grateful that there are others whose lives and contributions have been have been sufficiently well documented and preserved to serve as representatives of those who otherwise appear as footnotes or mere statistics in the extraordinary events of WWII. May they all be remembered.
