Crewmen still living?
Just a question....are any men from the "Dambusters" operation still alive in England? Any memoirs done?
shareThey are a dwindling few now. I know that Tony Iveson is still around, and is something of a public speaker on the dams raid and 617 squadron. Ken Brown {I think} makes the odd appearance on TV, usually in a laudibly non jingoistic role- it would be an inhuman story if it didn't carry with it regrets along with the pride.
Here's an article I just found which perhaps makes what I have just written out of date, althpough it's possible {it's the British Press, after all, and accurate reporting tends to be unimportant} that I'm not that far out.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1967597/Dambuster-veterans-reun ite-for-the-last-time.html
Flight Sergeant Ken Brown CGM, who was a member of the Royal Canadian Air Force, died in 2002, sadly.
Of the original pilots who flew the raid, only Les Munro (RNZAF) is still alive. Astell, Hopgood, Maudsley, Byers, Barlow, Otley, Burpee and Young were killed on the raid. Gibson, Anderson, Maltby, and Knight were all killed later in the war. (Maltby and Knight on successive nights that September when 617 made failed -due to fog- attempts at breaching the Dortmund-Ems Canal. In the case of Knight, he was at least able to successfully bail his entire crew out over Holland before the crippled aircraft crashed). Brown, Rice (who was shot down in December, but survived to become a POW), McCarthy, Shannon and Martin all survived the war, and have since died of natural causes.
Here's a link to the full list of crews, with their service records and whether or not they're deceased. http://www.breakingthedams.com/Resources/Chastise%20crew%20list.pdf
Hope this helps.