The Lost boys: Les Boivin and his crew

Les Boivin was the one who piloted the Lancaster ND331 on this fateful night of August, 29 1944.

In my mind, I call them boys. My lost boys. My silverwinged, lost boys. If you think it's too much, you're probably right, but I will tell you this: I call them boys because I feel for each and every one of them. I cannot call them otherwise, they are my boys - because here, where I am, nobody gives a damn about them.

Just look at them.

That's Les Boivin crew. They were so lucky before, and Les Boivin himself had all the chances of becoming a great pilot, and a hero.

That's, by the way, one of the 4 pages we have left of Boivin. Thirty one years of his life in four pages. Puts it all in some kind of perspective, doesn't it?

They were a part of 106th Squadron, based at Metheringham, Lincolnshire. The were a really close knit crew, and they managed to get out of some hardships earlier that summer. They left the base around 20:15, and the connection was lost not long after.

Now we know it was the part of the plan, called the radar silence: they were not to be noticed by the Germans. It backfired, as you can see “connection lost" remark on all service records. That meant no-one could actually know anything about the flying crews.

They arrived around midnight, and were taken by surprise with searchlights, flacand the city all alight. There was also a delay in bombing schedule, and that was risky too. But Boivin's crew managed to unload and went off home. However, they were noticed.

They were shot down, and before hand, coned and probably blinded with searchlights, just some kilometres off Neuhausen. Two of them, John Potter Nichol and Sidney Bell, became PoWs, two were identified - Hargill and Parker, and buried with one unidentified at Ossokino. That's five. No-one knows to this day, what happened to the brilliant pilot, Leslie Claude William Boivin, born on 31.01. 1913. Was he the one unidentified? Was he lost somewhere else? Did he burn so badly in the crash they couldn't get him out? As for the dashing McLean, his story is heart wrenching. He baled out, and was gone. John Nichol later recalled that the last time he saw him, he was preparing to jump - but he had no news of him since.

I guess, everybody was pretty puzzled, but you get many a story like that. I cannot imagine how poor Mrs.McLean felt when they told her Rob was missing. Or what a blow that must've been to his young wife. Missing in action. Gives you some kind of hope, doesn't it? Well, they were hoping up until the early seventies, when someone heard about a group of pilots in Singapore, of all places, who ended up there after some bizarre accidents, - and guess what? They distinctly heard the name “McLean” and alerted the parents. Poor Mr. McLean was so distraught, that being in shock, he just hung up. It took him several days to recover. Of course the Air Ministry took it under control, and of course, they couldn't find any traces.

Was Rob McLean lying somewhere in Fiddlers green, or was he, God forbid, found by the locals and killed? It could have been - earlier the very same locals tries killing his crew mates who were already dead. Such was the level of insanity in Eastern Prussia during the war, that people had no strength to cope and resorted to cruelty.

Sadly, John Potter Nichol and Sidney Bell vanished after returning home in 1945, and to this day, no-one knows what happened afterwards.

The remains of the crew are, I hope, still there, in a quiet cemetery, unharmed - waiting for a chance to get back home.

Give yourself a moment to ponder on this story. Does any of them deserve to be forgotten as they are? I don't think so. But that's the harsh truth. Nobody here gives a damn. And they should. But they don't.

I'll be revisiting them as soon I get more details, so stay in touch.