R5665
Crashes > of the R.A.F.
The Lancaster I, R5665 was returning from a bombing raid on Remscheid when it was hit and damaged by anti-aircraft fire. At the height of Düsseldorf, it was attacked by Uffz. Ernst Müller of the 5th / JG Hermann and hit heavily. The pilot, P/O Kenneth Maxime Reid, then gave the order to bail out, which all six crew members managed to do. All of them reached the ground, some of them injured, and were taken prisoner of war by the Germans.
For whatever reason, the pilot did not manage to bail out and crashed with the aircraft in the area of the lung sanatorium, a hospital in Viersener Straße, and burned out. The body of P/P Reid was found the next day in a barley field about 50 metres from the crash site. According to witnesses, he was buried in the cemetery in Mönchen Gladbach.
After the war, several graves of fallen Allied soldiers in Mönchen Gladbach were opened and the bodies exhumed. It is highly likely that there were mix-ups and it was ultimately not possible to clearly identify P/O Reid. As a result, there is no definitive grave for him on the Runnymede Memorial, only a memorial plaque.
Above:
The crash site of Lancaster R5665, below the crash site as seen today.
Centre left:
The Lancaster R5665 during maintenance work on the tarmac.
bottom left:
Pilot Officer Kenneth Maxime Reid of the RCAF