Pilot Officer DCJ McKendry

The Airmen who started at Sea

Time has created bland masks for the twenty-six airmen on the “Roll of Honour” but names like Ainslie, Watson, Hay, Lourens, McKendry and Nettleton tell uniquely different stories.

The Airmen who started at Sea

Denis Charles James McKendry joined the “General Botha” as Cadet No 936 from Parktown Boys High in 1937. He volunteered in 1940, trained as a navigator and served with Bomber Command’s elite Pathfinder Force where only the best crews were accepted and surviving a tour of 45 operations, very challenging.

The Airmen who started at Sea

Bomber Command’s “Battle of Berlin” between November 1943 and March 1944 resulted in over 1 000 aircraft and 7 000 aircrew losses at least half of whom were killed. WR Chorley suggests 4, “It is arguable that it had been five months of wasted opportunity, with thousands of aircrew lives lost for few tangible results”. Pilot Officer McKendry had flown several No 83 Squadron sorties when he became part of that statistic on January 3rd when four No 83 Squadron Lancaster’s failed to return and 28 aircrew members lost their lives, but not the only “General Botha” airman involved in the “Battle of Berlin”.

The Airmen who started at Sea

Lourens, McKendry and Nettleton are among the 176 South Africans who lost their lives serving with RAF Bomber Command commemorated at London’s Green Park Memorial.

The Airmen who started at Sea

Cadet No 928 Alastair James Hay joined the “General Botha” in 1937 at the same time as DCJ McKendry. Commissioned in 1940, Pilot Officer Hay volunteered for the RAF’s “Merchant Ship Fighter Unit” in 1941 and had no operational experience.

Spirits in the Sky

55 573 of 125 000 Bomber Command aircrew lost their lives, 9 838 became “POW’s” and 8 403 were wounded. At least 300 South Africans served as Bomber Command airmen an estimated 176 of whom lost their lives. No 9 Squadron Wellington pilot, Pilot Officer Harold Rosofsky the first to lose his life and the last, No 139 Squadron Pathfinder Mosquito pilot, 23-year-old Flight Lt Robert Ogilvie Day DFC, were coincidently educated at King Edwards in Johannesburg and frame names like Begbie, Bartholomew, Deas, Goodman, Hamman, Hirschfield, Howe-Brown, Lourens, McKendry, McGregor, Wing Commander JD Nettleton VC and Major Edwin Swales VC DFC.