The airmen fallen in 39-45

On 22 June 1944, an American B-17 was shot down 2 km east of Mont-Cauvaire and 4 km north-east of Monville. Having departed at 3:00 pm from Polebrook, Northamptonshire, England, with a crew of nine on board, it was hit by German anti-aircraft fire (FLAK) and burst into flames. Most of the crew bailed out before the aircraft exploded at 7:10 pm. Five men were taken prisoner, four of them at St Jean du Cardonnay: Lieutenants Robert Taylor Watkins (pilot), Frank David Williams (co-pilot), Douglas James Sier (navigator), Ralph Edward Hoover (bombardier), and the flight engineer, Sergeant Earl H. Louiso. Four of them were sent to a stalag in Bavaria; the destination of the fifth remains unknown.

Three managed to evade capture and were hidden in or near Montville until the end of the war: radio operator Sergeant Isadore Traschen, and gunner Sergeants Thomas F. La Grua and Ralph Futhey. The final crew member, 21-year-old Sergeant Leonard Kleinjan, died in the aircraft, likely killed by the FLAK. He was provisionally interred in the Mont-Cauvaire cemetery before being repatriated to his home in Dakota.

A second American aircraft, a B-26, was shot down over Mont-Cauvaire on 16 August 1944. It had taken off at 6:10 am from Station 164, Great Dunmow (Little Easton), Essex, United Kingdom, with a crew of seven. The plane was hit by Flak at 7:50 am. The left wing caught fire, which rapidly spread to the entire aircraft. Most of the crew bailed out; one successfully evaded capture, three were taken prisoner, and three lost their lives.

Lieutenant Nick John Mustari, the co-pilot, was found with a leg wound. He received medical attention and eventually returned to England. In her memoirs, Germaine Dauzou recounts: "...The seventh escaped them; he landed on the railway tracks and was not taken prisoner thanks to the presence of mind of the labourers working there; they took him away with them in a lorry once the working day was over." It is presumed this was Lieutenant Mustari.

Lieutenants Gordon Keith Madson (pilot) and Marvin Dale Lowman (navigator) were taken prisoner and sent to the Stalag at Barth Vogelsang. Sergeant John Peter Stankiewwicz, the radio operator, was also captured, though his place of detention is unknown. The body of the tail gunner, Sergeant Warren M. Hartman, was discovered on 19 August by a forest warden from La Houssaye. He was buried at La Houssaye on 20 August, then exhumed on 7 May 1945 to be taken to St André de l’Eure and, later, to Colorado.

Regarding the two casualties who fell at Mont-Cauvaire: the bombardier, Lieutenant Floyd Lee Parsons, perished in the burning aircraft and is buried at Colleville-sur-Mer (Calvados). Germaine Dauzou further recalls: "He fell in the courtyard opposite my house. His skull was fractured, his ankles broken; the cords of his parachute had burnt, as had his belt."

Sergeant Carl William Alfredson, the flight engineer, was found dead in a cherry tree and is buried in Massachusetts. The memorial in the cemetery, featuring a propeller blade from their aircraft, honours the memory of these two men.

For more informations :

• Crash du 22 juin  

sur Francecrashes:

• Crash du 16 août 

sur Francecrashes 

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