On June 16th, 1942, Stirling LS-X #N6088, took off from RAF Waterbeach in Cambridgeshire, on a routine training flight. On board that day were: (Pilot) P/O. M. Scansie (RNZAF); Sgt. E. Morris; Flt/Sgt. J. Tomlinson; Sgt. D. Robinson; Sgt. J. Smith; Sgt. R. Broadbridge; Flt/Sgt. H. Johnson (RCAF) and Sgt. R. Le Blanc.
At 15:25 the aircraft, a Stirling MK.I of ‘C’ Flight 1651 Conversion Unit (CU), left Waterbeach heading north-westerly. It was to be a routine cross country navigation exercise.
Around forty-five minutes later, the aircraft was seen on fire, and falling in a spiral toward the ground with its port wing detached, outside of the outboard engine. The bomber hit the ground on the Great North Road near to Barnby Moor.
The crew flying the aircraft that day were a young crew, the pilot being 24 years of age, whilst Sgt. Ernest Morris was 19, Sgt. David Robinson – 21, Sgt. Roland Broadbridge – 20, Flt/Sgt. Harry Johnson – 26 and Sgt. R. Le Blanc. the oldest at 27 years of age.
What also made this particular accident more significant was that the Stirling, a veteran of European Operations, had flown for nearly 250 hours on twenty-two operational sorties, a remarkable achievement for a Stirling!
The Stirling would prove to be a poor bomber. Designed to Air Ministry Specification B.12/36 (the very reason it was to be poor), it had to have a reduced wingspan to enable it to fit inside the currently available hangars. This reduction gave poor lift qualities, barely able to achieve more than 17,000 feet when fully loaded. Another restrictive feature was the bomb bay design. Being sectioned it could not accommodate the larger bombs being brought into production as the war progressed, thus it underachieved compared to its stable mates the Halifax and Lancaster. The original specification set out such requirements, and so the design was flawed from the start. It did however, have good low altitude handling capabilities, but this wasn’t enough to secure its future as a long term investment in Bomber Command.
As a bomber, casualties in Stirlings were high, and toward the end of the war it was reduced to secondary operations, an area where it more than proved its worth as both a glider tug, mine layer and paratroop transport aircraft.
Apart from Sgt. Robinson, all of the crew are buried at Finningley, St. Oswalds Church. Sgt. Robinson is buried in his home town Bedlay Cemetery, Lanark.
RAF Waterbeach appears in Trail 11.
Sources and Further Reading.
The crew’s interment along with photos of Raymond Le Blanc are available on the Compagnons de la Libération du Havre website.
Chorley. W., “Bomber Command Losses Heavy Conversion Units and Miscellaneous Units 1939-1947 ” Midland Publishing, 2003.
Aviation Trails 
Apparently at the briefings before raids started, the Lancaster crews would cheer if Stirlings were involved in the operation because the fighters would concentrate on this quite worthless aircraft. Butch Harris hated the Halifax but there certainly always used to be a good number of ex-crew who would speak up in favour of it, I’ve never heard anybody speak up in favour of the Stirling as a bomber, though, although it did perform well with glider towing, mine laying and paratroops.
Excellent post by the way. The word “Stirling” always gets the blood flowing for me (as does “Blenheim” and “Hampden”).
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Thank you for your valuable comment John. I hadn’t heard that particular reference but I’m not at all surprised. Certainly Stirling crews were almost left to their own devices when on missions, flying at low level, the Lancaster and Halifax crews increasing height to keep away from them. I also like the Stirling, but then I never had to fly one over enemy territory and at night!
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