The Wartime Memories Project - The Second War

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218085 F/O Daniel Joseph Heffernan Royal Canadian Air Force New York 415 squadron I have some photographs and documents from the late Major D J Heffernan USAF, Formally a Graduate of Loyola College. He served in the RCAF and then joined the USAAF after the USA entered the war. He was an Air Gunner in the RCAF with 415 Squadron based at Thorney Island, Hampshire, and a Gunnery leader/instructor in the USAAF based at Sudbury Suffolk UK. He kept a war diary during his USAAF service that shows although an American he had been schooled in flying and airmanship in a different culture than the one he later joined. He was a dedicated flyer and took the fight to the enemy, enjoyed the camaraderie and uniformed life in general even being a little bit of a dandy. He was pre-war a stock-broker in New York and although he did not have to involve himself in the war he joined the RCAF as an Airman Air Gunner at the age of 30+. He flew most of his 300 hours of operations in Hampdens and Wellingtons then a couple or more trips as an Aircrew Observer/Gunner in B 24s and possibly an odd trip in a B 17.He was divorced in the USA sometime in the early 1940s but re-married in England to a local Hampshire lady during the war. After the war he and his wife returned to the US to Travis Air Force Base but he sadly died of Tuberculosis in 1953. A short purposeful life lived it would seem to the full. D Donaldson-Davidson Add to this record.  Related Content: No. 415 (Swordfish) Squadron Royal Canadian Air Force RAF Thorney Island Can you help us to add to our records? Add a record to our website. The names and stories on this website have been submitted by their relatives and friends. If your relations are not listed please add their names so that others can read about them Did you or your relatives live through the Second World War? Do you have any photos, newspaper clippings, postcards or letters from that period? Have you researched the names on your local or war memorial? Were you or your relative evacuated? Did an air raid affect your area? If so please let us know. Help us to build a database of information on those who served both at home and abroad so that future generations may learn of their sacrifice. Contact us. Celebrate your own Family History Celebrate by honouring members of your family who served in the Secomd World War both in the forces and at home. We love to hear about the soldiers, but also remember the many who served in support roles, nurses, doctors, land army, muntions workers etc. Please use our Family History resources to find out more about your relatives. Then please send in a short article, with a photo if possible, so that they can be remembered on these pages.

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