400929 - Unaccounted airmen - 29-9-1940

**Henk Welting** · 3rd April 2008, 15:14

What caused the death of and/or what were the places of death registration for:

AC1 Ralph W. GIBSON - 637543
Cpl George R.F. GREEN - 359012
Both names not found in the Flight archives, and

LAC (Pilot u/t) TOWNSEND, Arthur H. - 938476 - killed on active service

Proposed aircraft losses for this day:

Harvard I - N7165 - 15 FTS - crashed on approach at night Kidlington
Master I - N7750 - 8 FTS - spun into ground 3 miles SW of Montrose
Oxford I - P9021 - 3 FTS - crashed in forced landing Salperton, Gloucestershire
(on this aircraft already on file as a casualty: LAC [Pilot u/t] Maurice J. PUMPHREY - 903238)

Regards and thanks for your help.
Henk.

**Amrit** · 3rd April 2008, 15:28

Gibson is given as DIED on Active Service.

A

**davew** · 3rd April 2008, 15:39

Henk

I cannot find Townend, Townsend or Townshend in the registers. However I note that he is buried at Woodstock which is not his home town, but is close to Kidlington. So perhaps he was involved in the Harvard incident.

regards

DaveW

**Henk Welting** · 3rd April 2008, 15:50

Thanks Amrit and Dave for your reactions.
Regards,
Henk.

**Dick** · 3rd April 2008, 16:14

Hi Henk
Gibson,19, is registered at Winchester, Green,37, is registered at Bristol
Regards
Dick

**alclark** · 3rd April 2008, 16:27

Master N7750 was a none fatal accident, the pilot (flying solo) 906244 LAC Baker abandoned the aircraft.

**Henk Welting** · 3rd April 2008, 17:37

Thanks Al and Dick.
Green may have been wounded in the air raid of 25-9-1940; he died in the Southmead Hospital 29-9-1940.
Regards,
Henk.

**Martyn A Critchlow** · 24th April 2017, 21:59

Biography of TOWNSEND in Wykehamist-War-Service-Record-and-Roll-of-Honour-1939-1945, pages 187 & 188.

ARTHUR HUGH TOWNSEND (r, 1929-34). Arthur Townsend was the third and youngest son of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Townsend, of Norton House, Stockton-on-Tees, and came to Winchester from Horris Hill to join his brother David in September 1929. He had the family reputation as a bowler, and developed later into a really good bat: people will remember his plucky attempt to enliven the second innings of Eton Match in 1934. It was characteristic of him that in the year he got into Lord's he won the Headmaster's Prize for Natural History, and he was as keen a philatelist as he was entomologist. He was a fine rifle shot, in the winning Country life team of 1934, and scored a "possible” in 1933, when the team was second. On leaving School he went straight into business in Bristol with the firm of his family's friends, Messrs. E. S. & A. Robinson Ltd., Printers. He was interested and successful in the business, and was working a district in Hampshire when the war started. He joined the Civil Air Guard first, and was in the final stage of his training as a Pilot (R.A.F.V.R.) when he was killed, through engine failure, in a night-flying crash over Woodstock in September 1940.

This indicates he was in Harvard I - N7165 - 15 FTS - crashed on approach at night Kidlington, but I still can not find him on register,

Martyn