P/O JER WOOD - shot down on 14th may 40

[ytarg]

Hi all,

This post concern the Hurricane N2490. About this crash, I'm looking for :
- a pic and a short biography of P/O WOOD
- combat report or more info about this combat

Does anybody has that ?

Thanks in advance.

Best regards from sunny Belgium.

[dennis_burke]

his promotion to Pilot Officer is recorded in the September 19th London Gazette under serial number 33617.

The 3rd October 1939 magazine contains a correction for that group of officers, they must have been printed with the wrong serial numbers.

The undermentioned Flight Cadets, having successfully passed through the Royal Air Force College, Cranwell, are granted permanent commissions as Pilot Officers, 29th July 1939 ••—
John Edward Randell WOOD (33448).
(Substituted for notification in Gazette of igth Sept. 1939 concerning these officers).

[dennis_burke]

if you have access to ancestry.com his name is listed on three family trees on that site. if you contact the owners they might be able to help.

his parents were Ethel Francis (nee Gaunt) and John Cecil Wood.
John was born in 1918 in Amesbury district, Wiltshire.

He had two sisters, one who died in 1938 and the other passed away in 2002.

One of the family tree's is probably owned by a close relative so it might be worth while contacting them depending on what you are using the information for.

[davew]

'Twelve Days in May' (Cull & Lander with Weiss) records

"Shortly after the successful engagement with the Henschel, the Hurricanes of 79 Squadron encountered about 15 Bf.110s- part of the ZG1 formation engaged earlier by 87 Squadron- five miles north of Leuze at 6000 feet. P/O John Wood (N2940) attacked two without apparent result, and was about to engage a third when he saw tracers passing his cockpit from the rear;

"About five seconds later bullet hit the back of my hand which was holding the throttle, and either it or another bullet punctured the reserve tank, the petrol pouring over the back of my head and body making it impossible to see out of the cockpit. The engine then cut dead and I pulled up the nose and climbed from 50 feet to 1100 feet where the a/c stalled. I abandoned the a/c, landing in a wood. I was picked up by a roving army patrol."

regards

DaveW

[ytarg]

Hi,

Thanks a lot to Dave and Dennis.

Dennis, can you tell me the name and the city of the WOOD's sister died in 2002 ?

More info about WOOD are still welcome. Still looking a pic ...

Best regards.

Christophe

[dennis_burke]

Cecilie Mercedes Randell BIRNEY (nee Wood) died Jan 2002 in Southampton district.

her husband died on the St Nazaire Raid in 1942.
http://www.cwgc.org/search/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=2366615