Totenliste 227. Who has it?

[CvdL]

For some years i'm looking for the so called German "totenliste 227" (casualtylist 227).
It list the dead found on a crash site as far as I know.
I'm especially looking for the crash of Halifax LK885 in the night of 25/25 may 1944 in Acht, a small village north of the town of Eindhoven in the Netherlands.
There are still two crewmen missing.
Documentation tells two dead were reported on the crash but only one is buried at Eindhoven cemetary. So what happened to the second one, of documentation is correct.

 

[AL90]

Don't have the Totenliste but according to this site 3 crew were killed:

Accident Handley Page Halifax Mk III LK885, Thursday 25 May 1944

Mission to Aachen. Takeoff at 22:50 hrs for a bombing operation against Aachen in Germany. Homeward-bound, the aircraft was intercepted and shot down by night fighter pilot Oberleutnant...

asn.flightsafety.org

On Pilot Officer Wilfred Carroll Lawson RCAF J19672 's service file there is an extract of Totenliste 227/12 which you may find interesting, it originates from the MRES- page 13. Also includes the evaders report of Sergeant Bruce Alexander Monson Fraser RCAF R192908

Collection search

Application Description

recherche-collection-search.bac-lac.gc.ca

Hope this is of interest,
Alan

 

[CvdL]

Alan , thanks for the info but unfortunately I can not view these files.all I see is two thumbnails and that's it. Can not download them and it takes ages to open the links.
Would it be possible that you copy tgesis info for me?
Thanks.
Regards,
Cees

 

[AL90]

Alan , thanks for the info but unfortunately I can not view these files.all I see is two thumbnails and that's it. Can not download them and it takes ages to open the links.
Would it be possible that you copy tgesis info for me?
Thanks.
Regards,
Cees

Hi Cees, there is not a lot on the files.
When you open the files it will take a long time to load as it is around 120 mb. Most Canadian service records run from 300 to 600 pages but only around 50-80 pages are usually digitalised, usually non crash related and non final fate related data. This file runs to 340 pages which is unusual.
If you are lucky the form 765c (Report on a Flying Accident not Attributable to Enemy Action) and Form 412 (Proceedings Of a Court of Inquiry) and sometimes Form 551 have the exact locations.
I don't know why this is, really frustrating as I was trying to locate a Beaufighter crash near Aberdeen and could see parts of the crash site photos behind the pages scanned so the only option is a magnetometer search of several fields or a trip to Ottowa.
I tried searching the International Red Cross, but they don't have the Totenliste digitalised which is poor.
Attached link gives a good insight into the MRES Service.
Hubert Brooks: The Life and Times
Hope this helps in some way,
Alan.

 

[Snautzer01]

Accident Handley Page Halifax Mk III LK885, Thursday 25 May 1944

Mission to Aachen. Takeoff at 22:50 hrs for a bombing operation against Aachen in Germany. Homeward-bound, the aircraft was intercepted and shot down by night fighter pilot Oberleutnant...

asn.flightsafety.org

 

[CvdL]

Hi Alan.
Thanks for the copies. Most important part is page three right about the middle where it is mentioned that there are TWO bodies found but only one is buried here at Eindhoven cemetary (Wilf Gosnay) !! The name P. Speech is also mentioned and may have been confused with Stan Beech.
I've came across speeches name before as I did research this crash and was present at the recovery of the remains of lk885 in the '90. So my interest in Totenliste 227 is to figure out what happend to the second body . Until today Lawson and Beech are still MIA.
Regards, Cees

 

[fubar57]

These are the claims for May 25, '44

 

[CvdL]

Hi Fubar. Take a look at the sglo website for the 25 th. (Loss register section). You'll find 19 aircraft for that day.
Your list does not mention the aircraft shot down by Schnaufer ( the ghost of St.Trond). He shot down lk885 and 4 others that night.
Regards,
Cees

 

[CvdL]

Alan,
Looked at the Eindhoven cemetary list and no "Speech"or "Peech" are listed in it.
So the puzzle is still around.
Regards,
Cees

 

[Snautzer01]

For some years i'm looking for the so called German "totenliste 227" (casualtylist 227).
It list the dead found on a crash site as far as I know.
I'm especially looking for the crash of Halifax LK885 in the night of 25/25 may 1944 in Acht, a small village north of the town of Eindhoven in the Netherlands.
There are still two crewmen missing.
Documentation tells two dead were reported on the crash but only one is buried at Eindhoven cemetary. So what happened to the second one, of documentation is correct.

Perhaps there were so few remains both airman are resting in Eindhoven. It must have been a busy night for the germans on the ground collecting the wrecks etc.

I asked over on TORCH.

 

[CvdL]

After the war the graves were inspected and the grave was markt as Gosnay's (flight engineer).
I've been puzzled on this for over 30 year now…..
Hence the search for totenliste 227.
Regards,
Cees

 

[AL90]

Don't mean to be grizzly or disrespectful, but after a severe crash the remains may have been very mixed and Gosnay's grave may contain the recovered remains of the two missing crew and identified as Grosnay by the only evidence available at the time. In some of the recoveries I've been involved with, the Crew have a known grave but parts still remain. The official RAF approach, during wartime was that 7 1/2 pounds in body weight constituted a body as this was the average birth weight at the time. In one recovery, the Maintenance Unit was told to end operations after 8 weeks of flooding and digging, we eventually recovered the remains at a depth of 25 feet under a main road. When recovering an aircraft today, the soil conditions can determine the state of recovered remains both aircraft and human, high acidic or alkaline soil tend to rot everything. In peat, we tend to find everything including documents perfectly preserved......including Merlins but that's another story.
Alan