Canadian pilot - F.D. JOLICOEUR

[Phil Listemann]

Hello,

I'm after the first names of the abovementioned pilot who served with the 607 in 43-44. His NCO service number R.67966 but he was later commisioned.

Does anyone know?

Thanks
Phil

[Matt Poole]

Phil,

Would this be your man? There is a photo of this F.D. Jolicoeur on his page of the Canadian Virtual War Memorial, which is found here:

http://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/rememb...detail/2719746

The caption to the photo, taken in India, says WO1 F.D. Jolicoeur was from 1446 Ford Boulevard, Windsor, Ontario, Canada.

Regards,

Matt
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Flying Officer Fernand Daniel Jolicoeur
who died on September 12, 1944

Service Number:J/18987
Force:Air Force
Unit:Royal Canadian Air Force

Cemetery: FORT SCOTT NATIONAL CEMETERY; Kansas, United States of America
Grave Reference: Sec. 2. Coll. grave 1786.

[JohnE]

Although he is buried in Texas he was actually killed in a Catalina crash in Nepal, India. The Catalina belonged to Strategical Air Force Detachment, India.

Source: They Shall Grow Not Old which uses the spelling Jolicouer.

John Engelsted

[Matt Poole]

Wonderful, John! Canadian Liberator researcher Robert Quirk had given me a copy of "They Shall Grow Not Old" as a gift about four years ago, but I completely forgot this source as I answered Phil's query. Thanks for mentioning it. One minor correction: Jolicoeur is buried in Kansas, a separate U.S. state north of Texas. Here is the full citation from the book:

JOLICOUER, FERNAND DANIEL F/O(P) J18987. From Ottawa, Ontario. Killed Sep.12/44 age 21. Strategical Air Force Detachment, India. The crew of a Catalina aircraft were engaged in evasive-action practice with fighter affiliation and crashed fifteen miles north-east of the Gawaa Road, Nepal, India. The Catalina was flying at 4,000 feet and, after carrying out evasive action with two fighter aircraft, turned sharply to meet another attack. The aircraft dived steeply, turned over on its back then crashed and exploded, nine airmen, not Canadians, were also killed. Flying Officer Pilot Jolicouer is buried in the National Cemetery at Fort Scott, Kansas, U.S.A.

Unsolved yet is the mystery of his burial in the Midwestern USA. This just was not the procedure for a Canadian citizen, so I can only speculate that there is a direct American family connection -- father and/or mother, perhaps?

I sent Phil an e-mail suggesting that the answer might be found in Jolicouer's RCAF personnel file held by the Library and Archives Canada in Ottawa.

Cheers,

Matt

[COL BRUGGY]

Hello,

l know of a case of an RAAF member who was killed in a USAAF B-24 in the Pacific area; not all of the remains were identifiable. He, along with the unidentified remains of the rest of the crew and passengers, were initially buried at Ambon. They were later repatriated to the US and buried there. This was not standard RAAF procedure, but there was little the RAAF could do, as it was a USAAF aircraft, and the bulk of the occupants were Americans.

Col.

[Matt Poole]

Hi, Col,

Reminds me of the US B-25 which crashed in Burma killing all aboard, including General Orde Wingate. The recovered remains are buried together in Arlington National Cemetery across the Potomac River from Washington, DC. I recall reading (in After the Battle, I think) that the diplomatic tug-of-war over the remains, and where to bury them, was won by the Americans, despite strong protest.

Cheers,

Matt

[COL BRUGGY]

Hi Matt,

Here is the gist of the agreement negotiated between the British Commonwealth and US authorities:

INTERMINGLINGED REMAINS OF BRITISH COMMONWEALTH AND AMERICAN DEAD.

With the entry of the United States of America into the recent war and the practice adopted whereby mixed crews operated in either Commonwealth or American aircraft, a problem arose as to the means of disposing of the remains in cases where the crew and/or passengers of crashed aircraft were individually unidentifiable.

Various conferences were held and it was ultimately suggested, as a compromise, that all cases where the majority of the occupants of the aeroplane were of Commonwealth origins, the whole of the remains would be buried in a Commonwealth War cemetery, Conversely, where the majority of remains were those of United States personnel, the remains should be buried at the discretion of the United States Government.

The suggested compromise was referred for consideration by the Government of America and, through the Dominion Office, to all Governments of the British Commonwealth. The compromise, as detailed above, received the approval of all Governments concerned and it became an established practice.

Imperial War Graves Commission - Anzac House, Melbourne - 23rd October, 1951.

l have not sighted the original documents, but the US stuck rigidly to this agreement. They exercised their rights under said agreement - no compromise!

Col.

[Matt Poole]

Hi, Col, and thanks for the excellent summary.

From the article entitled "The Death of Orde Wingate" by Dennis Hawley in issue 69 of After The Battle magazine comes more which may help explain why a Canadian, F.D. Jolicoeur, lies buried in Kansas, in the US, despite his death with nine others who were not Canadian (but, presumably being a majority of Americans):

. . .However, in 1946, the United States Government passed Public Law 383 which authorized repatriation to the USA of American service personnel killed overseas. Thus the policy of the two Allies was at complete variance. An American policy memorandum dated April 11, 1946, had already been sent by the Quartermaster General, Memorial Division, Washington DC, to the Foreign Office in London. It stated (in part) that "in the event that [a] group burial includes both American and Allied deceased. . .if the Allied deceased cannot be segregated, the Allied Government(s) concerned will be asked whether or not they would interpose any objection to the shipment of the group to the United States. If no objection is forthcoming, all the remains in the group will be returned to the United States for final burial in a National Cemetery. If there is objection to such removal, the remains of all the group will be finally interred in a permanent overseas American Cemetery."

The Wingate case is particularly complicated, though, and sad. The B-25 crashed on 25 March 1944, killing all nine aboard. Considerable human remains were buried by native Naga people in the crater caused by the B-25's crash. In early July 1944 Lt Col Christopher Perowne, chaplain with HQ 3rd Indian Division at Sylhet, mounted an expedition to the crashsite and recovered a small collection of bone fragments, which were placed in a tiny hole on the edge of the impact crater, under a teak cross with a bronze marker.

In April 1947 a joint British-American recovery team travelled to the crashsite and recovered only 20 small bone fragments, weighing three pounds, from beneath the same cross. The recovery team knew nothing about the substantial crew remains buried within the crater, yet considerable documentation already existed which, if they'd know, would have enabled them to locate the main burial site. The pathetically few bone pieces collected were taken for reburial at Imphal Military Cemetery on 10 April 1947.

In 1948 the US government informed the British government that the remains would be exhumed for reburial in an American war cemetery in Manila, Philippines. On 18 Dec 1949 the Imphal grave was, indeed opened and the contents transferred to Manila pending final disposition. In 1950 Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia (just across the Potomac River from Wash. DC) was designated as the final burial place of the Wingate group.

On 10 Nov 1950 the remains were interred in Arlington. It was an almost entirely American event, with few British in attendance, and with only the American National Anthem played. In fact, Wingate's widow was only informed of the burial on the very day it was taking place! A furore broke out when the news reached the British media.

For 25 years the Arlington grave was marked with a simple, flat gravestone. In 1975, at the request of the British Embassy, a new upright headstone was erected in a service of rededication (27 Feb '75).

But it doesn't end here! Dennis Hawley, the author of the After The Battle piece, wrote,

"After 45 years, I have indeed been extremely fortunate to ascertain the precise location of the remains of those nine occupants of the crashed plane who are not in the burial at Arlington. Even after all these years there will be no difficulty in identifying the burial area and since the remains of nine men are buried at a depth of some six feet there is no way that they could have disappeared during the years which followed."

In October 1988 Mr Hawley sent the US authorities evidence that the bulk of the remains of the nine men still remained buried at the crash site, with a direct appeal that they should be recovered. Six months later came the reply:

"[Your research] does not however prove the presence of recoverable remains some 45 years after the incident . . . the Army cannot adopt a practice of excavating areas in a speculative venture . . . the Army cannot, in good conscience, re-open this case and expend resources in the hope that the remains might be found."

I wonder why the US government's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) -- which actively seeks American war remains throughout the world -- has not, in more recent times, tried to recover these remains -- described as follows by Capt John Barnes of the Royal Berkshire Regiment, after reaching the crash site three days after the crash:

"Quite impossible to identify any of the bodies. Only three bodies have definite trunks but these are unrecognizable due to the fact that blast has made the faces etc. very mis-shapen. Two of the trunks wore clothes in American flying uniforms; a number of feet with American type flying boots on them were also found. . .The MO estimates that only five bodies could be made up from the bits lying around. My own estimate is that there are about 11 bodies in the vicinity of the wreckage. I base this on the fact that a considerable number of bodies are very charred and you do not realize it is a body until you stand by it."


What a pathetic shame...

Regards,

Matt

[Jagan]

Matt,

Today I was reading a book "The Bamboo Workshop" by R.S. Sansome (The history of RAF Repair and Salvage Units in India/Burma 1941-46). It has a considerable chapter on the Orde Wingate crash - including his arrival departure from Imphal and accounts of the crash site (Though it may have referred to already published literature).

[dennis_burke]

Found thegrave marker for Jolicouer and matched the Louis Schwartz to

440912* *OA-10 *43-43859 1ERF* Schwartz, Louis C* IND Armada Road*
https://www.aviationarchaeology.com/src/AFrptsMO.htm

So, an The 'Catalina 859" is 43-43859