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08-08-2008, 12:45 AM
| #1 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Orange County, CA
Posts: 10,283
| 'Great Escape' veteran Eric Dowling dies at 92 Great Escape' veteran Eric Dowling dies at 92 This is an undated family handout photo of 'Great Escape' war ... - Yahoo! News Photos Eric Dowling, who helped plan the mass wartime breakout from a German prison camp that inspired the movie "The Great Escape," has died at 92. Peter Dowling said his father died at a nursing home near Bristol in southwest England on July 21, a day before his 93rd birthday. The Aabletone Nursing Home on Thursday confirmed the death. Seventy-six Allied prisoners escaped from the Stalag Luft III prison camp on March 24, 1944, in a daring breakout. All but three were recaptured, and 50 were shot on the orders of Adolf Hitler to deter future attempts. The escape attempt was one of the most celebrated incidents of the war, recounted in a 1963 film starring Steve McQueen and Richard Attenborough. Dowling played a key role in planning the escape. He forged documents, made maps and was nicknamed "Digger" for his work helping to excavate the three escape tunnels, code-named Tom, Dick and Harry. Over almost a year, prisoners surreptitiously dug the tunnels 30 feet (9 meters) underground, shored up with bedboards and wired with stolen electrical wire. Tom was discovered by guards and Dick was abandoned, but the 300-foot (90-meter) long tunnel Harry was eventually completed. Dowling was not among the more than 200 prisoners chosen by lottery to make the escape attempt on the cold and moonless night. By the time German guards discovered the breakout, 76 men had crawled free. Many of the film's characters were composites of real people. Peter Dowling said the one that most resembled his father was a flight lieutenant nicknamed "The Forger," played by Donald Pleasance. But he also said his father was not a fan of the movie. "He wasn't the greatest admirer of Americans and it didn't go down too easily that one of them should be playing the starring role," Peter Dowling said. "A lot of the reality of digging tunnels was left out too." He said his father felt the scene in which McQueen attempts to race to freedom on a stolen motorcycle "was well over the top." Born in southwest England in 1915, Flight Lt. Eric Dowling flew 29 missions as a navigator with the Royal Air Force's Bomber Command. He was shot down in April 1942 and sent to the prison camp for Allied airmen near Sagan in eastern Germany — now Zagan, Poland. After the war, Dowling served as an RAF air-accident investigator and later worked for British Aerospace on the supersonic Concorde jet. Dowling's wife, Agnes Marie, died in 1997. He is survived by a son and a daughter.
__________________ "Pilot to copilot..... what are those mountain goats doing up here in the clouds?" |
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08-08-2008, 01:15 AM
| #2 |
| "Shooter"   Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Moorpark, CA
Posts: 14,809
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__________________  http://www.vg-photo.com For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return. Leonardo Da Vinci |
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08-08-2008, 08:32 AM
| #3 |
| IP/Mech THE GREAT GAZOO   Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Colorado, USA
Posts: 16,051
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__________________ "IF ITS RED OR DUSTY, DON'T TOUCH IT" |
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08-08-2008, 09:24 AM
| #4 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Adelaide Sth. Aust.
Posts: 12,511
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08-08-2008, 09:28 AM
| #5 |
| Older Than Dirt  Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Virginia Beach, Virginia
Posts: 7,309
| Saw this in the morning paper. Seems the lad was tick'd because "The Great Escape" movie starred an american. RIP Charles
__________________  I can only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow doesn't look good either.... |
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08-08-2008, 09:42 AM
| #6 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: Hurst, Texas
Posts: 2,827
| He's finally free now. BTW...since when has Hollywood ever gotten anything right?
__________________  Pillage, then burn. Argue not with dragons, for thou art crunchy and go well on toast. |
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08-08-2008, 02:34 PM
| #7 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Cracow
Posts: 4,207
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__________________  "A good fighter pilot, like a good boxer, should have a knockout punch..... You will find one attack you prefer to all others. Work on it till you can do it to perfection... then use it whenever possible." - Captain Reade Tilley, USAAF 7 Victories, WW-II - |
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08-08-2008, 02:56 PM
| #8 |
| "World Traveller"   Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Royal Deeside/St Andrews, Scotland, UK
Posts: 15,224
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__________________  "Success is not Final, Failure is not Fatal, it is the Courage to Continue that Counts" Sir Winston Churchill "To him the People of the World Largely owe the Freedom and Liberties they Enjoy Today" Enscription on Hugh Dowding's (AOC Fighter Command 1936-40) statue in London WW2 Talk: A WW2 Discussion Forum My Photo Collections on Flickr |
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08-08-2008, 04:23 PM
| #9 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: billingham nr middlesbrough uk
Posts: 3,115
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__________________  "We're not easily frightened. Also we know how hard it is for an army to cross the Channel — the last little corporal to try it came a cropper. So don't threaten or dictate to us until you're marching up Whitehall! ...and even then we won't listen!" quote from B.O.B movie |
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08-09-2008, 02:30 AM
| #10 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Dallas, Tx
Posts: 4,346
| All my respect...........
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08-09-2008, 04:20 AM
| #11 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Queensland
Posts: 4,543
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08-09-2008, 04:40 AM
| #12 |
| Senior Member  Join Date: Dec 2006 Location: FL
Posts: 3,294
| His life demonstrates that reality trumps fiction. . |
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08-09-2008, 04:44 AM
| #13 | |
| Senior Member Join Date: Dec 2006 Location: FL
Posts: 3,294
| Quote:
The move is credited with being extremely accurate except for that point and a few other details. . | |
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08-09-2008, 06:21 AM
| #14 |
| Der Crewchief  Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Ansbach, Germany
Posts: 33,152
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__________________  fly boy:"isnt that the first jet bomber becasue i have flown one in a flight sim before and i know how it handles"[/I] |
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