Photo From WWII Discovered Of Final RAF Raid Against Nazi Germany
A photo of a WWII final RAF Raid against Germany is revealed to the public for the first time, as this weekend marks the 70th anniversary of the last Bomber Command raid on Germany, published by the BBC.
The photo, capturing preparations of the final bombing raid was discovered by Brian Emsley, from Welwyn Garden City, UK, whose father, Edward Emsley is depicted in the far left of the photo.
The RAF crew shown in this photo took a moment to pose in front of a Mosquito aircraft and behind a bomb that was to be used on a raid against the Kiel canal. According to the publication, the ground and air crew were photographed on 2 May 1945 at RAF Downham Market in Norfolk.
Most of the details are shown in the photograph, as the date and destination is chalked on the side of a bomb, clearly indicating a monumental moment for those men depicted in the photo.
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As it turns out, they would be correct in memorializing that moment. U.K’s Ministry of Defence’s Air Historical Branch confirmed that this was, in fact, Bomber Command’s last raid against Germany.
The last raid against Germany took place two days after the death of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and while the Soviet army were advancing into Berlin, forcing Nazi forces to formally surrender.
According to the BBC, the Air Historical Branch, using the records of The Bomber Command War Diaries, by Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everitt, say that there had been no attacks by Bomber Command for several days before this final raid, with Germany’s armed forces facing imminent defeat and the expectation that the war was almost over.
However, there were concerns that ships were being gathered at Kiel to take German forces to Norway where they would continue to fight, so Mosquito bombers were sent to attack airfields around Kiel. They were to carry out two raids against the port – within 36 hours the town was occupied by Allied forces.
This photograph shows one of the crew members in an airfield in Norfolk, getting ready for this last raid. These photos represent the final phases of the war.
On May 4th, Field Marshal Montgomery took the surrender of all German forces, including naval ships, in north-west Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands, delivering the final unconditional surrender of all forces on May 7th.
Emsley, who discovered the photo while browsing through an old album says that this father had been in a reserved occupation at the time the war broke out, at the De Havviland aircraft factory in Hatfield, Herfodshire.
He suspects that his father volunteered to join the RAF in 1941 after many local people were killed at the Hatfield factory, when a German bomber made a lone raid on the paint shop.
Emsley’s father never mentioned this historic picture or the identities of the other people in then photo that illustrates the final moments of the Allied air raids on Nazi Germany. Edward Emsley died in 1979 along with those answers, for now.
Emsley is only left to imagine what his father must have felt at the time, saying that he must have been “elated and relieved at the prospect of peace about to dawn after six years of war”.
“He wouldn’t have enjoyed the idea of bombing because he was a peaceable, decent man. But he would have loathed tyranny and, by the courage of RAF aircrew whom he supported, totalitarianism in Europe was avoided”, Emsley said.
“Known affectionately as the “Mossie” to its crews and was also nicknamed “The Wooden Wonder” or “The Timber Terror” as the bulk of the aircraft was made of laminated plywood.”
