After 70 years, memory of aircrew still lives on

A SECOND World War veteran who has dedicated his life to preserving the memory of the lost crew of a Wellington bomber that crashed into the Cairngorms yesterday reflected on the 70th anniversary of the tragedy.

Andy Brown, 85, was 15 when he and his family trekked through waist-deep snow high into the mountains in 1942 to locate a Wellington bomber which had crashed into the hillside. It was two months before the frozen bodies of the eight-man crew could be recovered from the wreckage and buried in Dyce Old Churchyard, near the wartime RAF base which would later become Aberdeen Airport.

Half a century later, he led another expedition to retrieve the plane’s engines so they could be turned into a memorial to the men in the Deeside village of Braemar.

Yesterday, Mr Brown said: “I’m very proud of what I have done. I think it’s nice we have remembered these men – all of them were in their early twenties.”

He added: “It wasn’t until three months later that we could get access to the aircraft due to the horrible weather we had that winter.

“Only three complete bodies of the eight were recovered because the rest were completely burnt.”