Searching for relatives of WWII airmen

[patk]

Hello : my father, John Edward Kearney, died on active service in WWII over Eastern France in July 1944. He was a member of 576 squadron based in Lincolnshire, and was the navigator of Lancaster PB 253 ULA2. All members of the crew, save the pilot, died, and their graves are in a small church yard in the village of Chaumousey, Vosges.

A friend of mine who lives close to the village has been working to create two memorial plaques, one to be place by the graves, and the second to be placed at a monument that has been set up by the grateful villagers at the crash site itself.

Our hope is that the plaque will include photographs of the crew members, and so far we have managed to find four. Two others elude us. Their names are : Terence Patrick Barry (b. 1922 at Woolwich) and John Rowland Cuthbert (b. 1921, Lincolnshire). If anyone has done any genealogical research that includes these two and could point me in the direction of a possible source of photographs I'd be most grateful.
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[Pam Downes]

Starters for John Rowland Cuthbert

CWGC - aged 23, son of John and Annie Cuthbert, of High Kelling, Norfolk.

1939 Register
Living in Erpingham, Norfolk
John Cuthbert, born 17 Mar 1893
Annie, born 8 Jan 1891
John R, born 12 May 1921

John junior's birth registered June quarter 1921 Glanford Brigg (Lincs) registration district, MMN Smith.
No other birth registrations with MMN Smith in Lincolnshire or Norfolk between 1921 and 1939.

Marriage John Cuthbert and Annie Smith, September quarter 1920, Newark registration district.

Will dig deeper i(f no-one else does in the meantime) when I'm on the laptop.

Oam

[christanel]

John Rowland Cuthbert's probate awards administration to John Cuthbert, foreman carpenter. JRC's address is given as High Kelling Holt Norfolk.
Christina

[christanel]

I rather think that patjk has these basic details as recorded on his trees on ancestry.
Christina

[patk]

Thanks for the genealogical links & suggestions. I should have mentioned that I'd already gone that route before posting here, and so my apologies to all. It is profoundly dispiriting that there are no ancestry 'hints' to the two airman. We found Leslie Fielding by chance when his 92 year-old ex-girlfriend was shown a newspaper article mentioning my friend's work in France and kindly supplied her only memento of him -- the photo --to us.

[Lesley Robertson]

Perhaps it would be more efficient if you tell us what else you know?
Have you looked for reports in their local papers?

Have you looked for the pilot? He (or his family) might have photos.

[geneius]

Suspect OP is involved in this
https://aircrewremembered.com/archibald-jimmy.html

[patk]

Good idea. I am in touch with the pilot's son, who lives in New Zealand, but he has no photos other than those of his father. He did, however, let me have an emotional sound recording his father made following a pilgrimage he made to the graves of his crew. Newspapers may be a possibility, especially since the recently acquired photo of Leslie Fielding occurred after his 92 year-old old girlfriend was shown a clipping by her niece detailing my French friend's work on the plaque. However, the best source for newspapers is probably the Colindale Newspaper Library, an arm of the British Library, which is a bit out of reach since I live in California.

I have provided information to a number of RAF sites, but no results so far. aircrewremembered.com -- mentioned in the posting following this -- has information and photos, supplied largely by me but also my friend Ben who lives close to the grave. I've also sent the word out on Facebook, although that's probably a real long shot.

[Lesley Robertson]

I was thinking more of newspapers from the time - there are a couple of pay to use sites including Old British Newspapers and Find My Past that give access to collections online.

I spent some time photographing CWGC stones in the Netherlands, and was touched by a few places where one or two aircrew had survived, and the rest buried together. The survivors were eventually buried with their crewmates, even as late as this century. That’s a serious bond!

[patk]

Thanks Lesley. Yes, newspapers from the time are what I had in mind. Although I rather wonder if, with Wartime shortages, there were quite the number of 'local rags' (as my mum called them) being published. The nationals probably wouldn't be of much use. Obituaries would help. But tragically, my dad was the only crew member that was married. No widows or children, just grieving
parents and perhaps a sibling or two. The latter are our only hope of finding a contact I imagine.