Lorient
4 February 1943 — Lorient
- Date
- 4 February 1943
- Target
- Lorient, France
- Force dispatched
- 128 aircraft
- Aircraft lost
- 1
Narrative
Lorient, on the Brittany coast, was one of the great German U-boat bases, but its submarine pens were proof against any bomb then available. So Bomber Command instead set out to make the port unusable by destroying the town around it. On 4/5 February 1943 some 128 aircraft attacked, part of a sustained campaign that over the winter reduced Lorient and neighbouring St Nazaire largely to rubble. The U-boats sailed on from their concrete shelters, and the raids’ chief legacy was the destruction of two French towns.
Sortie details (which aircraft from which squadron, which crew flew, the outcome) will populate this page once the TNA AIR 27 squadron-diary importer arrives.
The fallen
133 airmen in this archive died on 4 February 1943 or the day that followed. For a raid of this kind these are overwhelmingly the night's losses, though a death-date match is not by itself proof an individual flew this operation.
- Sergeant George Chirrey Adam (27)
- Squadron Leader Hugo Throssell Armstrong (26)
- Sergeant Eric Atkins
- Sergeant Wilfred Eric Baker (22)
- Corporal Albert Arthur Baldock (27)
- Flight Sergeant Arthur James Douglas Barton (23)
- Leading Aircraftman James Colin Bell (33)
- Sergeant Robert John Bennett (24)
- Sergeant Wilfred Billingham (21)
- Leading Aircraftman John Thomas Bowler (26)
- Sergeant Gerald Macness Bown (28)
- Sergeant Denis George Busby (20)
- Sergeant Kenneth Clithero (25)
- Flight Sergeant Leslie John Corfield (22)
- Sergeant Thomas Cosford (36)
- Flight Sergeant Frank Crighton (39)
- Leading Aircraftman Edward Reginald Crump (25)
- Warrant Officer Class II Leonard Allan Cumming (20)
- Sergeant Frank William Dance (31)
- Flight Sergeant Frank Lawrence Darlington (23)
- Sergeant Douglas Gabriel Davies (21)
- Sergeant Hughie Francis Davies (19)
- Sergeant Amar Chandra De
- Sergeant Sidney John Dean (21)