This Oxford took from Millom airfield during the morning of 2nd November 1941 so the crew could undertake a cross-country navigation exercise with No.2 Air Observer School. The aircraft flew into cloud and struck the hillside close to the summit of Caw Fell towards the western side of the Lake District at just before 10.00hrs, sadly both airmen on board were killed and the aircraft was destroyed. The site was not located immediately and the crew were initially recorded as missing. The site appears to have been located on or just after 5th November 1941 and their bodies recovered.
Pilot - Sgt Charles-Andre DesBaillets RCAF (R/79007), aged 22, of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Buried Haverigg Churchyard, Millom, Cumbria.
Trainee Observer - LAC Henry Hodgkinson RAFVR (1176415), aged 29, of Allestree, Derby. Buried Nottingham Road Cemetery, Derby (Sec.F. Grave 2065).
Charles-Andre DesBaillets and his headstone at Haverigg Cemetery. He was born on 28th July 1919 in Montreal and attended Montreal High School and later Bishop's College School in Lennoxville, Quebec. He was working for the Bank of Quebec when he enlisted into the RCAF. He was the son of Swiss-born Emile Charles and Helene Jenny (nee Clavel) DesBaillets. His parents had moved to Montreal, Canada in the same year and he was their only child. His father Emile worked in the hotel buisness in Switzerland prior to 1919 and was manager of the high class Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Montreal from 1922 until 1940 with guests during that time including Winston Churchill. When the CWGC compiled their database Charles-Andre DesBailetts' parents are recorded as living in Sainte-Marguerite, Lake Masson, Province of Quebec but more likely at the time of his death they had been living in Montreal.
Henry "Harry" Hodgkinson was the son of Henry and Alice Hodgkinson and was the husband of Olive Hodgkinson, of Derby. I located his neglected grave in August 2016, it is very sad to see the grave of a young man who gave his life in the service of his country in such a state. I thank his great nephew Mr A. Harvey for kindly supplying the photograph of him shown above.
The aircraft struck the grassy slopes of Caw Fell, as seen from Seatallan in July 2015.
I visited the crash site in October 2003 and again in May 2018.
