Memorial

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Sgt Charles V. Owen graduated from Converse County High School in 1940. He worked at the Willamette shipyard in Oregon.

Aircraft 888, piloted by Lt Sugarman, went down over the target as a result of flak. The initial damage was sustained at an altitude of 24,000 feet, a big concussion was felt in the left wing and the aircraft peeled off steeply to the left. The general concensus of opinion is that A/C 888 then went into a fast dive. Some feel that it was spiralling and then went into a spin. Some report that there were moments when it seemed as if it would recover but that it was losing altitude too quickly. There was no fire observed, only faint smoke coming from one of the engines just before it disappeared. All props were turning. Some thought that the A/C disintegrated just before it disappeared into the clouds. Although no chutes were seen a gunner in A/C 598 saw 4 small objects come tumbling out. When last seen the aircraft was going straight down, in a slightly south-easterly direction.

Sgt Owen didn´t bail out because it was supposed that he was killed instantly when anti-aircraft shell burst in the nose or pilot section of the aircraft. He and S/Sgt Eldon A. Mau had no identification tags, or identification of any nature, that was able to be found in the aircraft's wreckage by the German searching parties.

One man, radio operator T/Sgt Harvey F. Schlotte, survived and became prisoner of war. The nine men who died were buried initially at the cemetery in Sinstorf, a southern suburb of Hamburg, Germany.