DDAY AVIATORS Le Manoir: This is The Day....

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On the night of June 5 to June 6, 1944 and D-Day, more than 12,000 Allied aircrafts (3,440 heavy bombers and 940 medium bombers, 4,190 fighters and bomber fighters, 1,360 transport aircrafts, 870 gliders, 1,070 maritime patrol boats, 520 aircrafts of the US Air Force (8th and 9th Army) and the Royal Air Force (Bomber Command, Costal Command, Air Defense of Great Britain, 2nd Tactical Air Force) participated in the Normandy landings.

 

Lieutenant Jacques Joubert des Ouches

 

Born in 1920, Lieutenant Jacques Joubert des Ouches  voluntarily engages him self in February 1940 as a student pilot in the French Air force. On June 17, he embarked for England and joined a few weeks later the Free French Air Force (FAFL) as a fighter pilot. In late August 1940 he participated in Operation "Threat", the failed attempt landing at Dakkar. Back in England, he resumed his training and obtained in February 1942 his Royal Air Force pilot license. In May 1942, amongs Squadron 242, he participated in Operation Jubelee on Dieppe. Promoted Lieutenant in September 1943, he was put to rest 2 months later and joined his family in Algeria. Not to fight seems to him inadmissible. He returned to England and managed to be integrated as a patrol leader in the french Berry Fighter Group, integrated in February 1944 into the Royal Air Force as Squadron 345 based in Ayr, Scotland.

 

At the dawn of the longest day, at the age of 24, with 220 hours of war flight and 174 missions, he wrote to his parents:

 

"This is the Day, think of us. I thank you for the education you gave me. After Victory don't forget us »

 

On June 6, 1944, at 10 am, he made his second flight of the day at the controls of his Spitfire Mk V (W3843). At 11 am off Utah Beach, he radio reports engine problems and that he's bailing out. His teammate sees him eject and loses sight. His body will never be found.