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Re: MIA For 60 Years, Pilot Finally Laid to Rest

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: May 22, 2003

"Hero is finally laid to rest

by Paul Carey, The Western Mail

THE most decorated airman of the Second World War was finally given a military send-off yesterday after being missing in action for almost six decades.

Wing Commander Adrian Warburton was laid to rest in a Commonwealth war grave in a small corner of southern Germany just miles from where he was shot down and killed 59 years ago.

His demise and whereabouts remained a mystery ever since he failed to return from a reconnaissance mission over Nazi Germany in April 1944.

But last year his crash site and remains were finally unearthed thanks to years of hard work by aviation researcher Frank Dorber, from Criccieth, North Wales.

And yesterday Warby, as he was affectionately known, was given a long-overdue official funeral with full military honours.

Prior to the burial at Durnbach Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery, a funeral service was held for the 26-year-old flying ace in the impressive Pfarrkirche St Agidius Church in the small town of Gmund in the heart of Bavaria.

Among the hundred or so mourners was Warby's widow, Betty Westcott, 91, who spent just a few weeks married to the pilot before he moved to Malta in 1940.

The pair made separate lives and she never heard from him again, but wanted to be present today to pay her respects.

Mrs Westcott, who has been remarried since, said, "It was all such a long time ago but I wanted to be here today because I felt I should be and it was proper."

The service was conducted by RAF chaplain the Rev Alan Coates and included a poem written by John Snook in 1943 praising Warby's brave deeds in the war effort.

There was also a reading by Air Marshal Sir Roderick Goodall.

Outside the church members of the Queen's Colour Squadron of the RAF stood vigil next to the hearse containing the pilot's coffin.

The picturesque village lay in the shadow of the rugged and tree-lined Bavarian mountainside, providing a memorable setting for the pilot's final resting place.

Warby, who was born in Middlesbrough, became a wartime hero after completing a series of daring, low-flying missions to photograph enemy targets so the allies could launch devastating attacks.

During the course of the war his photographs helped defend Malta, supported the North African campaign and assisted in the invasion of Italy, including enabling the sinking of the Italian fleet in November 1940 at Taranto - an offensive described by Winston Churchill as "a crippling blow."

On April 22 1944 the pilot, who received three Distinguished Flying Medals, left Oxford to photograph airfields in Germany but never returned.

Presumed to have been shot down by the Nazis, neither his body nor the wreckage of his Lockheed F-5B Lightning fighter were found.

The mystery was finally solved in November last year thanks to Mr Dorber.

After reading a biography of the hero, he matched US missing-in-action reports with German anti-aircraft battery records and narrowed the search down to the tiny village of Egling an der Paar, 30 miles north east of Munich.

Excavation of the site soon unearthed Warby's charred remains.

© Trinity Mirror Plc 2003"