143 Squadron RAF - Inquiry - Shot down by friendly fire!

[EDO]

Good morning listers,

On 11 January 1945, Flight Sergeant Waverly William HARRIS # 426459  an RAAF Navigator seconded to 143 Squadron RAF was 'shot down'.

From his 80 y.o. sister -
 
"His plane was shot down off the coast of Scotland after the 'Mosquito' had made a successful raid on German warships hidden in the fiords of Norway.

The 'Mosquito', marked RAF, had identified itself to 2 American fighter pilots.  Other RAF pilots heard the identification call but the 2 American fighter pilots did not heed the call and shot the 'Mosquito' down without question or opposition."

His memorial is at Runnymeade, Surrey, Panel 284.

Can someone kindly advise whether there woould have been an Inquiry, in-house or multi-service, into the incident, and/or where I might be able to seek relevant documents?

With thanks

Bruce EDMONDS [a cousin]
Brisbane, AUS

[manmack]

hello bruce,i cant find anything that mentions americans shooting him down,all i have about the raid is that they were getting ready to form up for the attack on the shipping and they were attacked by 6 ME109+FW190s from the north,then 6 more planes took off from lister and attacked from the south,in the dogfight 3 german fighters were shot down,the strike force consisted of 18 beaufighters from dallachy and 14 mosquitoes from banff,one beaufighter failed to return to dallachy and your cousins plane "M"mosquito was lost,but nobody saw him go down,his pilot was flight sgt p c l smoolenaers from belgium,this man may be of help to you,this is his e.mail address
colin[at]opsblock.freeserve.co.uk
hes colin jeffrey who researching the squadrons at banff from this period.
the squadrons diaries are in AIR 27 978/9 at the national archives,operations photos are in the photo archive at the imperial war museum,hopefully somebody will look them up for you,sorry i couldnt be of more help but good luck,mack

Moderator comment: email address modified to prevent spam and other abuses - please replace @ with [at]

[EDO]

Hello Mack,

Many thanks for your prompt response.  Frankly, I did not expect to receive a reply, let alone all of that information.

I will send an Email to Colin Jeffrey without delay.

Your efforts are very much appreciated.

Bruce

[annsa]

Bruce,

You can ask the National Archives of Australia for his service record to be digitised, it takes about a month to come online, but there may well be infornmation in that of help as the Aussie records are very extensive.
Also, I would suggest posting a message asking for information on the general queries message board at:

www.rafcommands.com

As one of the researchers that use that board may well have additional information of use to you.

Good luck,

Ann