Pilot Officer EA Goodman

The Dreaded Telegram

Twenty-two-year-old - year-Pilot Officer EA Goodman a No. 207 Squadron Lancaster pilot from Cape Town and his tail gunner,24-year-old Flight Sgt EV Evans from Johannesburg were among the 241 aircrew who lost their lives after 37 Lancaster’s failed to return from a Wesseling raid on June 22nd. 27 Evans and Goodman joined the RAFVR in Rhodesia in 1941. Edwin Arthur Goodman, a young man of colour, gave meaning to “a disadvantaged background” as attending a school with long held traditions an impossibility and, SAAF pilot training out of the question. Goodman had flown No 207 Squadron Lancaster’s for less than two months when the Air Ministry telegram was delivered to the family in Parow, a Cape Town suburb, a double blow as his father had died on June 12th 28.