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| Sergeant Gerard Willington Forster ASHWIN (976524) | |
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53 Squadron Royal Air Force Date of birth: 10th March 1908 Date of death: 4th February 1941 Killed in action aged 32 Commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial Panel 38 |
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| Gerard Willington Forster Ashwin was born at Abington in Hampshire on the 10th of March 1908 the only son of the Reverend Robert Forster Ashwin MA, a schoolmaster, and Lucy Maud (nee Box) Ashwin of Ashurst Rectory, Steyning in Sussex. He was educated at Magdelen College School, Brackley, where his father was a master, and at Lancing College where he was in Gibbs House from September 1921 to July 1927. He achieved his School Certificate in 1923, Higher Certificate in 1924 and was Joint Editor of “Lancing Miscellany” in 1925. He was appointed as a House Captain and as a Prefect in 1927. He won the Jodrell Scholarship to Queen's College Oxford in 1927. He was awarded Second Class Honours in Mathematical Moderations in 1929 and Third Class Honours in the Final School in 1931. On leaving Oxford he became a schoolmaster for some years before devoting his time to working out new methods in photography. In April 1939 he joined the Royal Air Force where he rose to the rank of Sergeant and trained as an Navigator during 1940 after which he was posted to 53 Squadron in Coastal Command. Gerald Ashwin and his crew took off from RAF Thorney Island at 6.15am on the 4th of February 1941 in Blenheim Mk IV T2283 PZ-F for an operation to attack the port facilities at Brest. The aircraft was shot down by a Messerschmitt Bf109 of II/JG77 and crashed into the sea off Morlaix with the loss of the entire crew. The crew was:- Pilot Officer Charles Patrick Morris (Pilot) Sergeant Gerald Willington Forster Ashwin (Observer) Sergeant Ian Ronald Wentworth Clark (Air Gunner) Two other aircraft from the squadron were lost on the raid. He is commemorated on the war memorial at Queen's College Oxford. |
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| Gibbs House |
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