New light shed on missing airman

10:26am Thursday 1st June 2006

A military aviation enthusiast could help reveal the fate of a locally-born airman who went missing in action in the Second World War.

Sergeant John Clarke, 22, who was born in Thwaites Brow, was a flight engineer on a Halifax bomber which crashed in Holland on the night of May 27/28, 1944.

His body was never found and his name is commemorated on the war memorial plaque in the lobby of Keighley Library.

After the war, his parents were told he could have been shot dead by the German troops who captured him.

Dutch wartime aviation expert, Adrian van Zantvoort, contacted Keighley Town Council in April, after the remains of Sgt Clarke's aircraft were discovered in south-eastern Holland.

An article published in the Keighley News alerted the airman's surviving relatives, who are now in touch with Mr Zantvoort.

Sgt Clarke's sister, Edna Ideson, who is 94 years old and lives in Cross Hills, said she always thought she would get "a knock on the door one day" from someone who knew what happened to her brother.

Mrs Ideson's daughter, Glenys Coleman, who lives in Hainworth Shaw, said her family was shocked to receive news of her uncle after such a long period of time.

She said: "My cousin, Stuart, is in touch with a man from Holland who might know more of what happened.

"We never expected this after so much time had passed.

"My mother was a bit upset when she heard. She can still remember a lot about her brother.

"I was only five when he went missing and even I can remember him.

"We still don't know the full details of how he died but we feel we've been given some sort of closure.

"We've thought about what might have happened to him for years. It's something that's never really gone away."

Mrs Coleman, 67, said her uncle joined the Royal Air Force on the day war was declared in Germany.

Following his training, he was posted to 432 bomber squadron stationed in East Yorkshire.

Mr van Zantvoort, who has spent 17 years collecting information on the air war over Holland, said Sgt Clarke's bomber crashed after its engines were set alight by German fighters. Three of its seven crew members, including Sgt Clarke, remain missing presumed dead' to this day.

Earlier this year Mr van Zantvoort, 48, found fragments of the Bristol engines belonging to Sgt Clarke's bomber He has since got in touch with a nephew of the airman, Stuart Clarke.

Mr Clarke, who lives near Milton Keynes, said he understood his uncle might have survived the crash but was later murdered by vengeful German troops.

He said: "After the war, John's mother and father had a visit from an RAF officer, who said three of the bomber's crew had hidden for several months in a farmhouse.

"Then the farm was searched by the German army.

"The airmen were handed over to the SS, after which nothing more was known.

"It was assumed they had been shot."