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PO. Arthur Marcus Fitzgerald, RAF(VR) 148128.
Pilot
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Arthur Marcus Fitzgerald was born on February 13, 1923 at Newport, Monmouthshire,
UK.
His parents were Gerald and Harriet (nee McGuire). He was one of three brothers, the
others being Donald and Albert.
Arthur attended school at Newport, first at Eveswell and Hatherleigh Central Elementary
Schools and then at St. Julian's High School between September 11, 1935 and February 5,
1940. He left school with seven passes in subjects at the Oxford School Certificate
level. His name appears on the Roll of Honour memorial to former pupils of the
school at St. Julian's who were killed in both World Wars.
click image to enlarge
He was accepted for pilot training by the RAF and whilst waiting to be called up, he
took various jobs including working as a clerk for GWR and taxi driving
He joined the RAF on April 4, 1941 and was posted to the Oxford Reserve. He continued
his flying training through-out 1941 and in 1942 was sent for further training to
Canada and the USA. While in North America he trained at Turner Field, Carleston Field
and Gunter Field. He returned to the UK to complete his training and finally on
June 8, 1943 he was posted to 207 Squadron, based at Langar Airfield, Nottinghamshire.
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Sergeant Arthur Marcus Fitzgerald.
Arthur flew his first op on June 12/13, 1943 on a raid to bomb Bochum.
In all, he
completed twelve ops including the famous raid on August 17/18, 1943 to bomb Peenemunde, the V1 and V2 rocket research establishment.
Between July and August 1943, he was promoted to Pilot Officer. At the time it
is believed that Arthur was the youngest Pilot Officer in the RAF.
His thirteenth raid took place on August 27/28 1943 and was an op to bomb Nuremberg.
Arthur failed to return from this operation and he, along with all his crew perished
when their aircraft, Lancaster, EM-N (ED627) of 207 Squadron RAF was brought down by enemy action near Schwäbisch Hall, Germany.
Arthur's ops took him on raids attacking the town's, cities and area's of Bochum, Oberhausen,
Mulheim, Wuppertal, Cologne, Mannheim, Peenemunde, Berlin, Nuremberg and in Italy Turin
and Milan.
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Arthur with his mother, Harriet and brother,
Donald.
Donald, flew with Arthur and the crew on a training mission, the day before their
death.
He had to leave the airfield at 10am on the morning of their last sortie.
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Arthur is top row, 5th from the left
The men in the dark caps are RAF personnel and the men in the light caps are
American. It is possible that that some of the RAF men pictured also became pilots of
207 Squadron.
click image to enlarge
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Diploma awarded to Arthur on completion of his Advanced Flying Training
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Arthur's grave in the Durnbach War Graves cemetery
Click image to enlarge.
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