The memorial at Woodhall Spa commemorates the 204 members of number 617 Squadron who lost their lives on operations from the squadrons formation 0n 21st of March 1943 until the end of the Second World War.
Among those names are the 54 officers and NCO's who
lost their lives on the night of 16/17 May 1943 attacking the Ruhr dams.
Five aircraft crashed or were shot down en route to their targets. Two
aircraft were destroyed while delivering their attacks and another was
shot down on the way home. The casualties are summarised in the
accompanying table.
| Aircraft / (Wave) | Captain | Flt/Eng | Navigator | Wireless Op | Bomb-Aimer | Front Gunner | Rear Gunner |
|
AJ-M (1) ED92/G |
Flt/LT JV Hopgood | Sgt C Brennan | F/O K Earnshaw | Sgt V Minchen | F/O GHFG Gregory | ||
| AJ-A (1) ED877/G |
S/L HM Young | Sgt DT Horfall | F/Sgt CW Roberts | Sgt LW Nichols | F/O VS MacCausland | Sgt GA Yeo | Sgt W Ibbotson |
| AJ-Z (1) ED937/G |
S/L HE Maudslay | Sgt J Marriot | F/O RA Urquhart | WO AP Cottam | P/O MJD Fuller | F/O WJ Tytherleigh | Sgt NR Burrows |
| AJ-B (1) ED864/G |
F/Lt W Astell | Sgt J Kinner | PO FA Wile | WO AA Garshowitz | F/O D Hopkinson | F/Sgt FA Garbas | Sgt Bolitho |
| AJ-E (2) ED927/G |
F/Lt RNG Barlow | P/O SL Whillis | F/O PS Burgess | F/O CR Williams | P/O A Gillespie | F/O HS Glinz | Sgt JRG Lidell |
| AJ-K (2) ED934/G |
PO VW Byers | Sgt AJ Taylor | F/O JH Warner | Sgt J Wilkinson | PO AN Whittaker | Sgt C McA jarvie | F/Sgt J McDowell |
| AJ-C (3) ED910/G |
P/O WHT Ottley | Sgt R Marsden | F/O JK Barrett | Sgt J Gutterman | F/Sgt TB Johnston | Sgt HJ Strange | Sgt F Tees |
| AJ-S (3) ED/865/G |
P/O LJ Burpee | Sgt G Pegler | Sgt T Jaye | P/O LG Weller | F/Sgt JL Arthur | Sgt WCA Long | WO JG Brady |
Hopgood's Bomb Aimer F/Sgt JW Fraser and his Rear Gunner P/O AF Burcher both managed to bail out and survived as POWs Sgt V Minchen also got out of the aircraft but was badly injured and did not survive the parachute drop. Fraser remembered hearing Hopgood screaming "For Christ's get out of here"! as he tried to keep the burning aircraft in the air long enough for the crew to bail out. Fraser went back to Canada after the war and named his son John Hopgood Fraser after his skipper who chose to die to give his crew a chance to live.
Other non-German casualties included 593 Ukranian and Dutch labourers and Belgian and French POWs. A further 156 were listed as missing
Those who died are forever in the shadows, 'courteous and pale'. Thanks to them, we are still in sunlight, with lives to live