850th BS
Meade Crew

The Meade crew are shown above at Mountain Home in early 1944, Frank Hines has identified the men in this picture as:

Back Row, L-R:
Bernard G. Niemann      - Gunner         ASN 17159595  (Orphaned)
Gerald E.  Mitchell     - Navigator      ASN 0698861   (EVR)
James L.   Lovelace     - Copilot        ASN 0758588   (KIA)
John J.    Meade        - Pilot          ASN 0810192   (EVR)
Frank E.   Hines        - Engineer       ASN 35374005  (EVR)

Front Row, L-R:
William R. Du Bois,Jr.  - Gunner         ASN 12039333  (EVR)
Ellis H.   Syra         - Gunner         ASN 35572604  (KIA)
Roy A.     Simmons      - Gunner         ASN 38428633  (Orphaned)
Edward J.  Jones        - R.O.           ASN 34645699  (EVR)

ASNs so-colored for EMs link to their NARA Enlistment Records.

Niemann and Simmons were released at Cheddington. The crew flew three combat missions in June of 1944 and a fourth on the night of 3/4 July 1944, but their sixth mission on the night of 4/5 July ran into trouble and they were shot down in B24H 42-95317 by a German night fighter. Lovelace and Syra were killed; Bonnin, Meade, Hines, Dubois, and Jones were all Evaders. Mitchell was captured after a few weeks in evasion and was interned in Buchenwald with 167 other Allied Airmen, including the four captured members of the Carscaddon crew, also there. They were removed to Stalag III in October of 1944 and eventually marched westward again as the Russians approached in the spring of 1945. Late in life, those held in Buchenwald were paid a settlement from the German government.

Below,L-R: Mitchell, Du Bois,Jones


Additional Crew Data sources: