Arnold J P Panther, 166 Sqdn & 153 Sqdn, RAF

Pg 137

"On 19 July 1946 Flying Officer Myhil, an investigating officer of No. 4 MRES enquiry team, was looking into a crash of another Lancaster crew - NF959. Although he found little evidence regarding the crew he was seeking, he did stumble across information in the Dinslaken area, which, by process of elimination, he has given as the most probable location for the crash site of JB297. The investigating officer spoke with a Mr. Albert Stein, who resided at number 14 Blucher Strasse, informed the officer that on the morning of 14 October 1944 he was on Luftschutz duty at his factory, the August Thyssen Works, situated in Thyssen Strasse, Dinslaken. Albert described how on the morning of 14 October , a four-engined heavy bomber came hurtling down and smashed into the roof of his rolling mill at the factory, killing all of the crew; he also mentioned that the aircraft did not burn. He personally assisted in the removal of the seven dead airmen from the tangled wreckage of the Lancaster; they were then interred in the Dinslaken Waldfriedhof cemetery nearby. Albert recalled quite clearly that the pilot was very tall, believed to be over 6 foot and had dark black hair; furthermore he also reported that another member of the crew was a very corpulent airman. He was also certain that one other aircraft crashed on this morning not far away but also in Dinslaken itself, with the crew buried nearby"

There's further information from a witness interviewed in 2010 as well as why this is the right crash site. Just don't want to abuse the author's copyright.

 

A pen picture of No 153 Squadron.The squadron was a short lived Great War squadron formed by the RAF a few days before the Armistice and like many squadrons was disbanded in the first year of peace after 8 months service

The squadron was reformed in October 1941 for the Coastal Command role equipped with the Defiant.Following the success of Operation Torch it was then was posted overseas to North Africa shortly before Christmas 1942,taking its Beaufighters to operate from Algerian airfields.

By September 1944, the squadron then equipped with Hurricanes and Spitfires had its operations from North Africa terminated and the squadron was disbanded on 5 September 1944.

As Lancaster manufacturing output accelerated, new B C squadrons were formed throughout 1944.No 153 Squadron was one such squadron and was reformed at Kirmington on 7 October 1944 to the standard RAF practice of taking an experienced Flight/ or individual experienced crews to form the foundation of a new squadron.

Sergeant Panther appears to have been lost on his first op with No 153 Squadron.The fact that a figure of 27 ops has been reference might be the ops that the remainder of the crew had done with No 166 Squadron or with previous squadrons .Sergeant Panther would have been posted in to Kirmington after HCU training,

Flight Engineers were the only aircrew in training that were not required to attend an OTU but went straight from HCU from RAF St Athan where I would think his flight engineer training took place.The RAF took the view that flight engineering training with engine ground training modules was adequate enough and did not warrant OTU crew training. A Flight Engineer would normally join a squadron as part of a HCU crew.

On 15 October 1944,following the Duisburg raid from Kirmington, the newly reformed squadron was posted to Scampton within No 1 Group Bomber Command and commenced bomber operations from Scampton for the rest of the war.

 

Thanks both for the above posts. Been very busy lately so my research has stalled somewhat. I will provide an update when I get his service records.