F/Lt.. Anthony Graham Sadler
Royal Air Force 100 Squadron
from:Guildford
Tony was shot down on July 13th 1943 at about 0700 hrs over Brest. He was piloting a Lancaster Bomber EE 183 HW-P that had returned from a bombing raid on the Turin railyard, they were based at RAF Waltham (Grimsby) His crew members were ;
EE 183 came down below 1000 ft to get a visual as their instruments were damaged by an electrical storm earlier, they were supposed to land in Cornwall, refuel and retun to Waltham, unfortunately Cornwall turned out to be France! Not just any bit of France, but Brest one of the most heavily fortified harbours in Europe.
- A G Sadler 148132
- J Egleston 1487782
- M J Maloney 1031746
- W E Broxup 657446
- R A A Howe 657446
- R R W Parker 158598
- A Burton Aust 413527
Machine gun fire opened up on them from a fighter, then all hell broke loose, ack ack, heavy machine guns, the works, now coming from the ground, 2 engines caught fire and the plane was well alight. Tony ordered the crew to bale out, unfortunately the rear gunner was trapped in his turret and badly wounded. Tony changed the order and started looking for somewhere to land. Bob Parker the upper gunner spotted an airfield a short distance away, this turned out to be Guipavas. Guipavas in 1943 was occupied by a German fighter squadron, and this was the airfield Tony landed on. Hydraulic fluid was now all over the cockpit windscreen making visibility very poor. Bob gave Tony instructions from his position to aid the landing. They were still been fired on, and a third engine caught fire, as was most of the aircraft. Bob said bullets were flying past him missing him by inches. Bob was very lucky and was the only person not wounded, even the mascot got its nose shot off! The plane landed but with no hydraulics. Tony swerved the plane round causing the undercarriage to collapse, but stopping the Lanc. before it hit a hanger. The Lanc burnt out on the airfield, totally destroyed. All the crew got out, wounded, apart from Bob, but safe.
They were all made POWs, Tony was taken to hospital in Paris for a month, recovering from a wound in his leg. He then went to Barth Stalag Luft 1, from 23/8/43 to 1/11/43, he was then moved to Stalag Luft 5 in Hyderkrug from 4/11/43 to 10/4/44. Then on 13/4/43 he was transfered to Sargan (Zagan) Staluft luft 3, Tony stayed here until the Great March as the Russians approached Sargan, and was moved out 28/1/45. Tony finally ended up at Tarmsted and was liberated on 7/4/45 and retuned to UK. It would appear that none of the crew ever met up again, all were interned in different camps,and all went their own ways after the war.
