Order of Service for the Dedication/Memorial Service of the 75th Anniversary of the loss of US Air Crew Liberator

BOOKLET: Order of Service for the Dedication/Memorial Service of the 75th Anniversary of the US Air Crew Liberator nicknamed the "Jigs-Up" at Holyhead Breakwater Country park.

During the latter years of the Second World War, the US 36th Bomb Squadron were secretly working with the RAF to jam German radar. On December 22, 1944, following one such mission over Europe, the 10-man crew of the B-24 Liberator, The Jigs Up, were returning to land in the UK when they were diverted to RAF Valley, near Holyhead in the North of Wales, due to adverse weather. Although two other Liberators successfully landed at the air base, The Jigs Up had to turn around and attempt a second landing. As they approached the North Stack, just off the Welsh coast, the plane ran out of fuel. Under the belief that the plane was over land, the Captain, Lt Harold Boehm, told eight members of his crew to parachute out, however they were actually over the Irish sea and all eight were lost. Lt Boehm and his co-pilot, who also parachuted out, managed to survive, one landing at Holyhead and the other at Trearddur Bay.

In the early 1990s, Stephen Hutton of North Carolina traveled to Wales to research more about The Jigs Up, a plane which his father, Iredell had flown on many times as a tail gunner. An article published by a local newspaper in 1992 raised awareness of Mr Hutton's investigation, and not long after, Welsh diver Brendan Maguire retrieved two propellors from the floor of the Irish sea, and working with Stephen, a memorial was constructed to remember the sacrifice of those US Airmen. One of the propellors is now in the US, at the US National Museum in Fort Fisher, North Carolina, whilst the other was recently relocated in 2014 to the Breakwater County Park in Holyhead to create a more prominent memorial for those lost Airmen.

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Compiled by Amanda Sweet for Archifau Ynys Môn using the following source: Archifiau Ynys Môn/Anglesey Archives, WM/2708

https://www.theamerican.co.uk/pr/ne-North-Wales-Ceremony-Remember-US-Air-Crew-Jigs-Up

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