FIFTEEN KILLED

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21633, 9 February 1945, Page 3

FIFTEEN KILLED

BRITISH OFFICIALS PLANE FALLS INTO SEA PART OF PREMIER’S STAFF (10 a.m.) LONDON. Feb. 8. Fifteen passengers 'and the crew were killed when a York transport plane carrying the Prime Minister’s staff to the “Big Three” meeting crashed into the sea on February 1. They included officials closely connected with the ministers and also high-ranking officers, but none of the principals in the mission. The plane developed engine trouble. When one engine spluttered and stopped, the aircraft captain instructed the wireless operator to tell the land authorities that he was in difficulties. Then he headed for the nearest landing field. The plane lost height with every mile flown because it was heavily loaded with 20 people and baggage. The wireless operator for fully a quarter of an hour signalled: “We are going down. We are going down.” The plane could not make the distance to land and fell into the sea off the beach and broke in half.

All the passengers were killed, except Air Commodore H. A. C. Anderson, of the Air Ministry, who was seriously injured. Three members of the crew are missing and four injured. The passengers killed were: Mr. P. T. R. Losley, who was Sir Alexander Cadogan's private secretary, Mr. Armine Dew, Mr. John Chaplin, Miss Sullivan of the Foreign Office staff members, Mr. Robert Guthrie, King’s Messenger, DetectiveSergeant H. J. Battley, Mr. Anthony Eden’s bodyguard, Colonels' I. S. Hooper and W. G. Newey, Captains A K. Charlesworth and W. H. Finch of the War Office, Group Captain P. S. Jackson Taylor of the Air Ministry, and Leading Aircraftman J. Chicken, of the Transport Command.