4 Sept. 1939 The first Canadian airman is killed while serving in the RAF in WW 2 The first Canadian combatant to die in the Second World War was Sergeant Albert Stanley Prince, a bomber pilot of the Royal Air Force’s Bomber Command. He was killed within 24 hours of Great Britain’s declaration of war on Germany and while attacking cruisers of the Kreigsmarine in Wilhelmshaven, the German Navy’s main base on the Baltic. His death came a full two years and three months before America entered the war, and was the first Canadian death of more than ten thousand to die in the service of Bomber Command alone. The First of the Ten Thousand by artist John Rutherford, John Rutherford Collection, Bomber Command Museum The title is based on a Bible verse,"A thousand may fall at your side, And ten thousand at your right hand; But it shall not come near you.". Psalm 91:7 Canadian Virtual Military Museum
Sergeant Albert Stanley Prince Service Number: 580195 Age: 27 107 Squadron BECKLINGEN WAR CEMETERY Born: November 22, 1911 Montreal, Québec Son of Harold Braithwaite and Eliza Prince of Neston, England. Husband of Winifred Mary Prince, father of William of Chester, England.
RAF CWGC War Dead Query 1939 and Blenheim IV N6240 [Royal Air Force Aircraft Serial and Image Database] (From the under construction CWGC database project)
