LEST WE FORGET
Flight Sergeant Robert Lockyer MASTERS
Service No: 432681
Born: Tumut NSW, 5 March 1921
Enlisted in the RAAF: 16 January 1943
Unit: No. 150 Squadron (RAF), RAF Station Hemswell
Died: Prisoner of War (Murdered) (from the loss of No. 150 Squadron Lancaster aircraft PB853 on 24 March 1945), 24 March 1945, Aged 24 Years
Buried: Reichswald Forest War Cemetery, Kleve, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
CWGC Additional Information: Son of George James Masters and Emma May Masters, of Tumut, New South Wales, Australia
Roll of Honour: Tumut NSW
Remembered: Panel 127, Commemorative Area, Australian War Memorial, Canberra ACT
Lancaster PB853 took off from Hemswell on the 24 March 1945, detailed to bomb the Harpenerweg benzol plant at Dortmund, Germany. Nothing was heard from the aircraft after take-off and it failed to return to base. The aircraft crashed at Witten-Herbede, Germany and all the crew members baled out safely but five were killed after being taken into custody and two kept prisoner. One of the group implicated in the crimes committed was sentenced to death, while a second received a fifteen year jail sentence.
The crew members of PB853 were:
Flight Sergeant Harvey Hayward Bawden (419835) (Mid Upper Gunner) PoW, Discharged from the RAAF: 18 March 1946
Flight Sergeant John Clement Davis (1814561) (RAFVR) (Flight Engineer)
Flight Sergeant James Henry Gillies (433557) (Air Bomber) PoW, Discharged from the RAAF: 20 November 1945
Flight Sergeant James Noel Griffin (435186) (Rear Gunner)
Flight Sergeant Kevin Anthony Kee (430174) (Navigator)
Flight Sergeant Robert Lockyer Masters (432681) (Wireless Air Gunner)
Pilot Officer Philip Henry Morris (423161) (Pilot)
References:
Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour On-Line Records (RAAF Casualty Information compiled by Alan Storr (409804))
Commonwealth War Graves Commission On-Line Records
Department of Veterans’ Affairs On-Line WWII Nominal Roll
National Archives of Australia On-Line Record A705, 166/27/856
Bibliography:
Millett, J. (John Antill) (432401) Iceman: Poems WWII, Five Islands Press Associates, Wollongong University NSW 2500, 1999