Prisoner of War (POW) Crashed near Wegeleben on 7/7/44 in B-24 44-40110. Was on his 14th mission when shot down.



Early in July 1944 Bernerd Harding as piloting a B-24 of 859th Sqdn., 492nd BG out of North Pickering on his 14th mission when he was shot down. His plane 'Georgette' had just off-loaded its bombs when they were attacked by fighters. With inboard engines on fire Harding ordered the crew to evacuate. Years later he discovered that all ten aircraft of the

squadron had gone down that day. He parachuted into a wheat field where he was greeted by three farmers, 'two with pitchforks, one with a gun' who drove him to a cellar already

holding two other captured fliers. They were there for several hours and that is where Harding dug a hole and buried his silver pilot's wings.



Eventually German soldiers arrived and transported them initially to Halberstadt AFB from where, three days later, they were taken to an interrogation centre in Frankfurt. After ten months in the Luftwaffe POW camp at Barth they were liberated by the advancing Russians,



In 2008 Harding attended a ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery to mark the burial of six airmen whose remains had been discovered with the help of local Germans. It gave him an idea and a friend helped him seek information about the village - Klein Quenstadt - where he had so long ago buried his wings. They managed to contact a resident one Dr. Ulrich

Heuke who set about trying to locate the exact spot, narrowing down to four houses in the village. Harding planned to take his family in the near future and investigate further.



(Journal Fall/Winter 2009)