LEST WE FORGET
Sergeant William Edwin LOGAN
Service No: 415158
Born: East Perth WA, 26 June 1912
Enlisted in the RAAF: 21 July 1941
Unit: No. 2 Squadron, 22nd Bomber Group USAAF
Died: Air Raid, Port Moresby, 17 August 1942, Aged 30 Years
Buried: Port Moresby (Bomana) War Cemetery, PNG
CWGC Additional Information: Son of William and Edith Alice Logan; husband of Mary Olive Logan, of Mt. Hawthorn, Western Australia.
Roll of Honour: Perth WA
Remembered: Panel 98, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
Remembered: Cenotaph Undercroft, State War Memorial, Kings Park WA
It was over this scene (7th Division reinforcements to support the defence of Kokoda) that 24 enemy bombers flew on the morning of 17th August. There had been a complete respite from air attacks since the 77th raid on 1st August. Now it was broken by 150 bombs dropped accurately and in perfect pattern on the Seven Mile aerodrome. With but four minutes’ warning the American fighter pilots did not get off the ground and the enemy formation, despite the anti-aircraft fire, made their attack unscathed. Their bombs demolished the aerodrome control tower and operations hut at the side of the runway, destroyed 5 aircraft and damaged 11 others severely. For the weight of bombs dropped, casualties were comparatively light—one man killed and 13 wounded. A column of dense smoke rising from the burning aircraft was the tell-tale to a lesson expensively learned; the aircraft destroyed and damaged—Marauders and transports—had been parked closely together at one end of the runway, for even the Seven Mile aerodrome was still lacking in revetments. Most serious was the loss of the transports—two Dakotas destroyed and five more so seriously damaged that they had been put out of commission.
Extract from Gillison, D. (Douglas) Royal Australian Air Force 1939-1942, Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1962 – page 600
Sergeant Logan was serving with the USAAF on the crew of a Marauder and was killed in the air raid. The Dakota aircraft damaged or destroyed were operated by the USAAF.
References:
Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour On-Line Records
Commonwealth War Graves Commission On-Line Records
Department of Veteran’s Affairs On-Line WWII Nominal Roll
National Archives of Australia On-Line Record A9301, 415158