Photograph of Pilot Officer Frank REECE (RNZAF), a Kiwi pilot who served with No. 500 Squadron at RAF Bircham Newton during WW2. No. 500 (County of Kent) Squadron had moved to Bircham Newton from RAF Detling in May 1941, staying until April 1942. Initially, they were equipped with Bristol Blenheims, but these were replaced with Lockheed Hudsons from around November 1941. The squadron flew reconnaissance, anti-shipping and anti-submarine missions and bombing raids on enemy ports and coastal aerodromes. A detachment of the squadron was sent from Bircham Newton to operate from RAF Harrowbeer, near Plymouth, from the 15th of September to the 6th of October 1941. On the night of the 28th of September, Frank Reece flew his Blenheim (Z6163) from Harrowbeer on a raid against submarine pens at St Nazaire. Frank’s aircraft was hit in the port engine by anti-aircraft fire and was forced to ditch in the shallow water of the bay of St Efflam in Brittany (around 50 miles from Brest). Frank, alongside his two crew members, Sergeants William Henry SMYTTH and James Douglas APPLEYARD, waded ashore and hid in some nearby woods until daybreak. The next morning, Frank approached a young French woman and, using his schoolboy French, tried his best to explain their predicament. Following this conversation, Frank and his crew were quickly taken in by the local French resistance. For five weeks, they were hidden and supplied with civilian clothes and forged papers while they awaited their attempt to escape to Spain. They got as far as Nantes before they were rumbled and captured. Initially, they were labelled as spies because of their clothes and false papers. They were sent to Fresnes Prison near Paris, where they spent the coldest winter of the war in solitary confinement in appalling conditions. Every night, they could hear the screams of other prisoners being tortured by the Gestapo and wondered when it would be their turn. Fortunately, a friendly guard sympathetic to their plight arranged for them to be transferred to the Luftwaffe reception centre at Frankfurt. Frank would be sent to Stalag Luft III, Sagan. While in Stalag Luft III, Frank Reece played a role in the famous Great Escape, helping to dig the tunnels and make escape compasses from razor blades and gramophone needles. He was number 129 on the escape list, but the tunnel was discovered after the 76th man crawled through. In 1945, the prisoners were evacuated from Stalag Luft III ahead of the Russian advance and force-marched across Germany. Frank was eventually liberated by Montgomery’s 11th Armoured Division near Lubeck and repatriated to England. He returned to New Zealand in 1946, where he married and became a successful businessman. He died in 2001.