This is a Halifax Mk II Series 1, serial W1048, built in 1942 and flown by No. 102 Squadron and No. 35 Squadron. On 27 April 1942, during its first operational mission, it took part in an attack on the German battleship Tirpitz in a Norwegian fjord. Damaged by anti-aircraft fire, it came down on a frozen lake where it eventually sank, which does rather explain its current look.
Seen from the front, what survives feels less like a machine and more like evidence. Sensibly, no attempt has been made to flatter the thing back into glamour. The aircraft was recovered from the lake in 1973 and it eventually made its way to this museum. In what must have been a slightly odd reunion, members of the flight crew came here in 1983 to be reunited with the aircraft when it was installed here in this exhibition.
It must have been rather sub-optimal for the RAF to lose W1048 on her first mission, but at least there was a controlled landing and no-one was killed, although there were injuries. The crew members were:
Pilot Plt Off Don P MacIntyre (a 24 year old Canadian)
Observer Plt Off Ian Hewitt (Also operated as bomb aimer and Navigator, had been commissioned 23 Mar 42; posted to No.35 Squadron 31 Mar 42; later received the DFC and became a Squadron Leader navigator with the Pathfinder Force; a chartered accountant in later life, he died in June 2015, aged 94)
1st WOP/AG 908781 Sgt Dave Perry
2nd WOP/AG R56057 Sgt Pierre Blanchet (Mid upper gunner. A Canadian)
Tail Gunner 633143 Sgt Ron Wilson (A London cabby in later life)
Flight Engineer 524209 Sgt Vic Stevens
It was thanks to the Norwegian resistance that these crew were able to make their way to neutral Sweden and then safely back to the UK. I won’t recount the entire story, but it’s at http://www.archieraf.co.uk/archie/1048tls.html and it shows just how challenging it was for the airmen to get back home. It’s still hard to comprehend how difficult it must have been for them to try and get back to some sort of a normal life after the Second World War ended.