Full medal write up
WW2 RAF service tunic, with named label, Sergeants stripes and Flight Engineers wingsthat belonged to 546494 Flight Sergeant Douglas Joseph James Timms, a Flight Engineer of 100 Squadron Royal Air Force, who was killed in action during a sortie to Nurnberg on the night of 1 January 1945. Condition of the tunic is excellent.
With the tunic is a small pocket diary for 1945 found in the top left pocket of the tunic. This with very few entries but noting his operational sorties in mid to late November 1944 and rather poignantly, his last entry is on the 1 January 1945, the day before his last flight.
It is not clear when Douglas Timms joined the Royal Air Force but he passed his Flight Engineers course at No 4 S,of T.T. at RAF St Athan on 16 August 1944. Initially flying in Halifax’s at No 1662 Conversion Unit, he crewed up with Flying Officer P. M. Bunn on 26 September 1944. Converting to Lancaster’s on 1 November 1944, Timms and the Bunn crew joined 100 Squadron based at Waltham, Grimsby, on 13 November 1944.
Taking part on their first operational sortie on 26 November, an attack on Freiburg, Timms would take part in the following Sorties during November and December 1944:
29 November 1944 – Dortmund – aircraft slightly damaged by flak
4 December 1944 – Karlsruhe
6 December 1944 – Mersburg
12 December 1944 –Essen
17 December 1944 – Ulm
28 December 1944 – Munchen Gladbach
29 December 1944 – Gelsenkirchen
2 January 1945 – Nurnburg – Missing in action
Timms was killed in action on the night of 2 January during a raid on Nuremberg, when his Lancaster III, PB518 HW-P, was shot down Hptm Kurt-Heinz Weigel, crashing at Schlierbach.
The Crew consisted of: F/O P. M. Bunn POW, Sgt. D. J. J. Timms KIA, F/O L. J. Holford POW, F/O R. E. Marsh POW, Sgt. J. E. Benton KIA, Sgt. W. C. Muir KIA, Sgt. R. Poulsom KIA.
Details of exactly happened to Timm’s and his aircraft were revealed in a letter written by Paul Bunn, who was the pilot of his Lancaster bomber, to Mrs Timms on 16 June 1945:
'Dear Mrs Timms, I was very pleased to receive your letter. Frankly I cannot understand why the Air Ministry haven't communicated with you. I would have written to you earlier only I felt that perhaps it would only be rubbing salt into an open wound. Well now on the night of Jan 2nd we were caught by fighters and were hit in the petrol tanks which immediately caught fire. Within a few seconds the aircraft just blew up in mid-air and myself, navigator, bomb aimer were blown clean out of the airplane. Now at the time your son was sitting next to me and when he got the burst from the fighter he collapsed and slid into the nose of the A/C and that was the last I saw of him. I did my best to find out from the Germans exactly what happened to them and they told me definitely that four of the boys were killed. Well now again they said that the boys would be given a decent funeral like their own people. There is another consolation and that is none of the boys could possibly have suffered in any way an d were killed outright. We were shot down near a small town called Goppingen about 20 miles S.E. of Stuttgart. In closing please accept my sincerest sympathy and in future if I can possibly help you please don't hesitate in writing as I would only be too glad to do anything for you.'
Details of Lancaster PB518’s last flight, list of crew and fate of each and details of the German pilot; Hptm Kurt-Heinz Weigel, who shot Timms Lancaster down, can be viewed here:
https://aircrewremembered.com/bunn-pm.html
http://www.rafcommands.com/database/wardead/details.php?qnum=45512
Provenance: Descent through the family to auction and directly to Jager Medals.