Remembrance Day has passed; the remembering continues. Few families in Hawarden, Sask., a village of about 200, had been untouched by the Second World War — of those who left to fight, 13 did not return.
So it was a great relief for Melville and Olga Perry when the war ended. Four sons had served; four sons had returned.
Ross Perry, now of Sidney, the fifth son, was too young to enlist, but he looked up to his older brothers. William had joined the Royal Canadian Air Force the day the war started. Jack did two tours of operations out of Malta as a wireless operator and air gunner. Joe also joined the air force but was discharged because of serious illness. Douglas trained as a paratrooper to fight in the Far East, but the war ended before he was sent into combat.
Ross said the family waited in agony when Jack was reported missing after his plane was shot down off the coast of Africa, but he was rescued and sent to England on a hospital ship. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.
On Sept. 15, 1946, more than a year after hostilities ended, an RCAF Dakota transport plane carrying 20 pilots and a ground crew member crashed at Estevan, Sask., killing all aboard the plane, including Flying Officer William Albert Perry, 28.
Among the 20 pilots killed were nine recipients of the DFC. Two more received the medal posthumously.
The youngest was 20, the oldest was 34. Most were in their 20s.
“They were very experienced pilots,” said Ross. “They went through a lot during the war, and they all came back. That was the tragedy of it all.”
William had a varied career in the air force, serving as a flight instructor with the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan and flying Pacific and Atlantic patrols in Catalina amphibious aircraft.
He was also part of the Ferry Command, flying planes from Canada to England for war in Europe
While that didn’t involve combat, it was still a task with plenty of danger. Before the Ferry Command began operations, about a hundred aircraft had attempted to fly across the North Atlantic and only about half succeeded. During the war, with more than 9,000 planes transferred to Europe, flying the North Atlantic became routine.
Canada was central to the air training plan, providing more than 131,000 air crew for the war effort. The end of the war left thousands of unneeded aircraft parked at bases scattered across the West.
William Perry and his comrades were ferrying Cornell trainer planes, obtained from the U.S. under the lend-lease program, from Estevan to Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota.
The Dakota transport plane was bringing the pilots back to Estevan for another series of ferry flights. The plane approached the runway for a normal landing, then the pilot gunned the engine and attempted to go around for another approach. The pilot appeared to lose control and the plane crashed into a ravine at the end of the runway.
Investigation of the burned wreckage showed the crash was due to an elevator control lock that had not been removed before the plane took off, making it impossible for the pilot to control the plane during a landing.
It’s about 400 kilometres from Hawarden to Estevan, but 16-year-old Ross was at the crash site the next day and viewed the burned wreckage. He saw the 21 caskets lined up, a memory that haunts him still.
The crash brought grief to 21 families from across the country who had seen their sons serve diligently during the war and survive. They came from across the country, from B.C. to P.E.I. One was a U.S. citizen who had joined the RCAF.
Thirteen young women became widows, some of them with small children. William and his wife, Bernice, had a two-year-old son, named Jack, after his uncle.
Despite the crash, Ross followed his keen interest in aviation, and has owned six different planes. In the mid-1960s, he made a pilgrimage to Estevan, landing his plane near the spot where the Dakota went down 20 years before.
“I kicked around in the ravine and pieces of the wreck were still there,” he said. One of the pieces was the airspeed indicator, which he picked up to give to William’s son, Jack, who now lives in Vernon.
Remembering for the Ross family, and so many others, doesn’t stop after Remembrance Day.
“I think about it always,” said Ross. “It never leaves my mind.
“Life deals some pretty cruel blows.”
