PEOPLE in Wallingford are being asked to honour two airmen who sacrificed their lives to save people in the town.

On September 9, 1944, a Halifax bomber of the Royal Canadian Air Force caught fire while returning from a raid over the French port of Le Havre.

Still carrying a full bomb load, the aircraft caught fire over Wallingford after an engine exploded.

Flying Officer John Wilding ordered his crew to bail out and he and the flight engineer, Sgt John Andrew, steered the bomber away from the town before it crashed into fields at Newnham Murren, on the Crowmarsh Gifford side of the river.

Each year, around the time of the anniversary, there is a memorial service at the cairn at the junction of Wilding Road and Andrew Road. Town mayor Lynda Atkins, who chairs Oxfordshire Royal British Legion, is asking people to attend this year’s service on Sunday, September 13, at 2.45pm.

The pilots were mentioned in dispatches for their bravery, with Wilding posthumously awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Former RAF officer Ms Atkins, who became the first chairwoman of the county’s RBL earlier this year, said: “I am delighted that the RBL is leading this and making sure these airmen will never be forgotten.

“It would have been devastating if the bomber had hit Wallingford. We would have lost dozens of lives and a large chunk of the town centre.

“Instead, there was a very big hole in a field.

“They must have known they were not going to survive. It was an astonishing act of bravery.

“The airmen gave their lives for others and that is why the two streets have been named after them, so that they will always be part of the map of the town.

“It is very important that they are not forgotten, so I would like as many people as possible to come to the service.”

The mayor added that Army Cadets and Air Cadets would attend the service at the junction, where a memorial stone has been erected.

Acting secretary of Wallingford RBL Linda Shoebridge has a personal debt of gratitude to the airmen.

She said: “I was a little girl living off Wood Street and I recall seeing the smoke on the Crowmarsh side of the river. The plane had 10 500lb bombs on board.

“Undoubtedly people would have been killed if the plane had crashed in Wallingford and it would not exist as we now know it.”

Mrs Shoebridge has been involved in the memorial service since 1990 and was a UK representative of the Royal Canadian Air Force 426 Squadron Association.

The memorial stone with the squadron’s badge has been there since 1960.

The Canadian flag is also flown over Wallingford Town Hall each year.