Flight Sergeant Peter Whittaker

23 Apr 1923 – ?

About: A 617 Squadron air gunner shot down on the Dortmund–Ems Canal raid of 23/24 September 1944, hidden at Markelo and Laren, taken prisoner there on 1 or 2 November and held at De Kruisberg, Doetinchem. He was one of the men who jumped from its train for Neuengamme on 1/2 February 1945, was hidden in the Achterhoek, and was met by British troops on 31 March or 1 April 1945; he was awarded the DFM (gazetted 7 December 1945) and mentioned in despatches (31 January 1947).

Unit or role: RAF flight sergeant, 617 Squadron, air gunner (mid-upper gunner by Osprey, Cooper and Wilson, tail gunner by Braakman), service number 1587036 (a warrant officer on the Dutch forms), born 23 April 1923 (Kew's entries); Lancaster NF923 (KC-M), pilot Flt Lt G. S. Stout (Bateman, Osprey, p. 122).

Where: Markelo, Holten, Laren (Gelderland) and Verwolde; Deventer and Doetinchem; Halle and Varsseveld in the Achterhoek. Home address on the Dutch forms: Gordon House, Blackheath Park, London S.E.3, except Koeslag Sr's table of the men he sheltered, which has S.E.8 (p. 14), and Berenschot's handwritten slip, which has no Gordon House: "109" (one figure unclear), Blackheath Park, Blackheath S.E.3 (p. 3).

Who hid him: Jan Willem Ebbekink of Markelo, born there in 1907, gave "food and shelter to … W/o Peter Whittaker R.A.F. for 4 days Sept.44" (Ebbekink's file, p. 17); his own table has "W/O Pete Whittaker, c/o Gordon House Blackheath Park London S.E.3.", come down near Markelo on the 23rd of a month it does not give, with him three days, "picked up himself", and passed on to Schipper at Holten (p. 3). The Dutch forms call him a warrant officer, where the Kruisberg list has a sergeant and Kew a flight sergeant.

Evidence: ✓ Berenschot's forms and Mellendijk's; ✓ Doetinchem Herdenkt's list of the 17; ✓ Kew's entries; ✓ the London Gazette of 7 December 1945 and 31 January 1947; ◐ his own reports to intelligence as quoted in Wilson's Journey's End and Braakman's The War in the Corner (Kew's reports not read), and ✓ the books of Cooper, Bateman and Taylor (below); ◐ his report as given in the appeal for news of Peter Thorne of 5 October 1945 and its answer of 9 October, in De Nieuwsbode of Doetinchem (5 October; 9 October) and De Graafschapper of Winterswijk (5 October; 9 October), two items, each printed in both papers: the appeal of 5 October (signed by Thorne's family and the RAF's MRES, giving Whittaker's report) and the answer of 9 October (the information that reached the Wisch town hall at Varsseveld).

Who he was. Kew's catalogue and the IS9 list give his name, squadron and age; none of Kew's reports is digitised and none was read, so his own words below are as the books print them.

• ✓ Kew's liberation questionnaires have "Peter Linn Whittaker. Rank: Flight Sergeant, 1587036, 617 Squadron", born 23 April 1923, a cover sheet only, the catalogue dating it 1 April 1945 (WO 208/5433/45). A second entry, AIR 85/352089, has "P L Whittaker", 1587036, the same birth date (same file).
• ✓ The IS9 list of reports has "2/1054/2448 F/Sgt Peter L Whittaker, 617 Sqn Lancaster MF923" (the list). Kew's catalogue has that report as WO 208/3352/2448, "Appendix C Included. Appendix D Included", and two card-index entries with the same reference, IS9/WEA/2/1054/2448; the first adds "Captured near Larun Holland" (WO 208/5273/2698). ◐ "Larun" is very probably Laren, where the Koeslag farm stood (below).

The crew and the raid. ✓ Bateman's Osprey book has, under "24 September 1944 – Operations (Dortmund-Ems Canal, Germany)", "Lancaster B I NF923/KC-M, Crashed near Lochem, Holland", and the crew: pilot Flt Lt G. S. Stout, killed; flight engineer Plt Off A. W. Benting, killed; navigator Flg Off C. E. M. Graham, killed; wireless operator Flg Off R. J. Allen, PoW; bomb aimer Flg Off W. A. Rupert RCAF, evaded; mid-upper gunner Flt Sgt P. L. Whittaker, PoW; rear gunner Flg Off R. H. Petch, evaded (p. 122).

• Wilson's Journey's End has the raid:
  • 617 Squadron's Lancasters met 10/10 cloud over the aqueducts near Ladbergen, and Whittaker, "a mid-upper gunner in the crew of F/Lt Geoffrey Stout, one of those who had just returned to Woodhall Spa from Russia", reported that they could not find the target and were ordered to abandon the search, and that after leaving the target area he heard cannon shells hitting the aircraft (Wilson, p. 17; p. 19).
  • Wilson adds that the Schräge Musik of the night fighters was unknown to the gunners, and that Whittaker's report "makes it clear" it was used (pp. 19 and 135).
• His own report to IS9, as Wilson prints it:

I saw no enemy aircraft about, but also saw no flak. I think we were attacked from below. I climbed down from the turret, saw flames coming from the bomb bay and with the bomb aimer [F/O W. A. Rupert] went to the scene of the fire … I ran into the navigator [F/O Clyde Graham] who seemed to be terribly wounded … I spoke to the pilot as I passed him. I do not know whether he had been hit, but he seemed a bit strange. He was groping around for his parachute unsuccessfully and I went back to find one for him. I heard a yell and thinking he had found his chute I returned. As I started to ask the pilot about it he pushed me away and said, 'Get out!' As I baled out I could see two chutes below me.

— F/Sgt Peter Whittaker · report to IS9, as quoted in Kevin Wilson, Journey's End · 2010 · p. 20

• ✓ Cooper's Beyond the Dams to the Tirpitz tells the same night from the pilot's side:
  • Stout "jumped by night fighters shortly after leaving the target", losing three engines; the navigator Graham badly wounded and pushed out with a parachute fitted; Stout without a parachute, which "had probably been used for Graham", Whittaker finding him a spare and Stout ordering him out (p. 99).
  • By Cooper the engineer Benting died in hospital at Enschede on the 25th, Graham, the son of a major-general, was buried at "Oostobeak" [sic, Oosterbeek], Stout at Lochem, and Allen, the wireless operator, was taken prisoner (p. 99; p. 100).

Landing, and the first farms. In his report, as Wilson prints it, he landed wounded in the head and the right elbow and made for the south-west; about an hour on, at a farm, he saw one of the men leave the room, was held up with a pistol by another, kicked him, took the pistol and ran, a car then heading for the farm, which he later gathered belonged to "noted NSB" (Dutch fascists) (Wilson, p. 24). At the next farm "a very friendly welcome", food, dressings and a doctor for the arm; a few days later a note from Rupert, asking him to join him in a barn on the grounds of a large farm (p. 25). Braakman has the same words as a British Military Intelligence report, the second farm, 't Peurtje at Markelo, and the date of the shoot-down as the evening of 23 September (Braakman, p. 107; p. 108). ◐ The two books print one report, so they count as one source.

From Markelo to Laren. Five more helpers' forms follow him from the Markelo hiding to the Koeslag farm at Laren, whose raid may be how he was taken.

• ✓ Arend Jan Schreurs of Markelo has "Peter L. Whittaker", RAF, down at Markelo in "Sept. '44", hidden from "16-9 '44" for 14 days, received from "Kees Schipper, Holten" and passed on to "Kolkman, Buisweerd, Laren (G.)", and on his form "This man gave food and shelter for 14 days" (his table, p. 7, typed; the handwritten copy p. 5 has "15 Sept '44"; both checked on the images).
• ✓ Arend Schipper of Holten, "Kees", lists among the airmen he received "Peter L. Whittaker", RAF, "22-9-44", Markelo, beside "Bill", Lt O. Baker of the Parachute Regiment, J. G. Miller, L. Langley and a Norwegian lieutenant (his table, p. 6, checked on the image).
• ✓ A. J. Koeslag Sr of Laren lists "P.L. Whittaker, Gordonhouse Blackheath Park, London S.E.8", RAF, in a table of men he sheltered, with Fedoruk, Crook, Elroy, Thorne and Granath, and no dates on his row (p. 14). A second table has "Peter Whitaker", RAF, "Sept-Nov '44", 60 days, from "Markelo - escort Koeslag G. [?]", and "made prisoner of war together with Koeslag" (p. 19).
• ✓ A Koeslag of B 44, Laren, born there in 1929 (◐ a daughter of Koeslag Sr, from the surname and address; her form does not say so), wrote on 8 January 1946 "Escorted Whitaker 5 miles on bike, at night" (her form, p. 2). Her table has "Whitaker", RAF, "Sept. 1944", Laren, received from "v.d. Veen", "escort G. Koeslag on bicycle at night 5 miles", passed to "Koeslag Sr." (p. 3; both checked on the images). The names she gives are not those on Schreurs's form (see "Where the sources disagree").
• ✓ The address matches Ebbekink's "c/o Gordon House Blackheath Park", so it is the same man on those forms. Koeslag Sr's son A. J. "Appie" Koeslag's recommendation of 1946 puts him on its partial list of about sixty pilots, and the Americans note that when the SD raided the farm, with the father captured and Appie forced to flee, the SD seized a list of about forty pilots (the recommendation, p. 12; an address list that was kept, p. 19).
• ✓ Johan Volgers Dinius of Deventer, of the Laren group, has "Peter Whittaker London", RAF by its ditto marks, shot down in "Aug.44" near Laren, hidden "Aug/Nov 44", 50 days, received from Kolkman (Laren) and "was arrested and escaped again"; higher up are "Peter Thorne(Kingston England)" and "Johnny Warren", with a second "Johnny" (September 1944, Laren, 20 days, from Kolkman) and "Rags" just above him, and below "Julian Glandd" [sic], Pol. div. (Dinius, p. 4, checked on the image). His "Aug.44" is against every other source, which has September (below).

In the marsh camp and at Laren. By his report as Braakman prints it, "on about the fifteenth day" he was given a bicycle and went in a convoy of eighty to ninety Dutchmen on the run to a marsh with a small island and a camp, "a kind of arsenal to which supplies were brought daily"; he fell ill, was taken to Laren for a doctor, was moved when the Gestapo were reported near, and joined Thorne and Granat, living for three weeks in a chicken run in a thicket by Koeslag's farm, "uneventful" (Braakman, pp. 108–109). Braakman names the camp as the "pilots' lair" at Verwolde (p. 107) and the other men at Buisweerd, Jan Kolkman's farm, as Lt Guthrie, Capt James, Sgts Johnny Warren and Peter Thorne and the Polish tank driver Julick Granat (p. 108). Wilson has "three Arnhem evaders, two sergeant escapers from Stalag IVB near Munich and a private from a Polish tank division" join him in Rupert's barn, then a convoy of 80 to 90 "Dutchmen on the run" to a marsh camp (p. 25).

The raid on the farm. ◐ Whittaker's own words, as Braakman prints them: "About four o'clock one morning, one of the family at the farm knocked at our hideout and told us the Landwacht were around." He had buried "quite a lot of incriminating evidence", including a military wireless transmitter and car plates from a Gestapo car blown up by the underground; Braakman dates the raid at Laren, with hundreds of Landwacht and SD men round Albert Koeslag's farm, to the early morning of 2 November 1944 (p. 109). Taylor, writing of Peter Thorne, has them "betrayed to the Landwacht" on 1 November and taken first to Laren, then to the SD prison at the Landwacht headquarters at Deventer, and Thorne in December to "Oxelhoft prison" there (◐ the Oxerhof); Wilson has the Dutch camp "surrounded in October" (Taylor, p. 435, p. 436; Wilson, p. 133). ✓ The Koeslag farm was searched in November 1944 and the father held until April 1945 (Koeslag Sr's recommendation, p. 10; Frank Coslett, whose fellow prisoner at Assen Koeslag Sr was). Koeslag's own second table has Whittaker "made prisoner of war together with Koeslag" (above), and Kew's card index has him "Captured near Larun Holland". ◐ Koeslag Sr's own questionnaire of 13 July 1945 dates the raid 2 November 1944 and says two English pilots, "Lange Pieter" and "Kleine Pieter", and a Pole were captured at the farm and taken to the Kruisberg (p. 13); Kleine Pieter is Thorne (Peter Thorne) and Lange Pieter very probably Whittaker.

De Kruisberg and the train. Two pages of Doetinchem Herdenkt's account of the Kruisberg transport name him, and both put him among the men who left the train.

• ✓ Its list "Van De Kruisberg naar Neuengamme" has the entry "Whittaker, Sergeant RAF, registratienummer 1537036", and its entries for Knegtmans and Spijkerman say that Peter Whittaker was among the airmen lodged at Erve Buisweerd, the farm that was raided (the list).
• ✓ The entry is under a heading that the 17 men below it "sprongen op 2 februari 1945 … uit de rijdende trein" (sprang on 2 February 1945 … from the moving train), between Doetinchem and Winterswijk and between Winterswijk and Ruurlo. By our count it names fourteen and has "naam ontbreekt nog" (name still missing) for the other three. The 77 who stayed on, it says, reached Neuengamme on 5 February (the list).
• ✓ The foundation's page on the Kruisberg prisoners has a numbered list headed "De 17 mannen uit de Kruisberg die ontsnapten uit de trein naar Neuengamme" (the 17 men from the Kruisberg who escaped from the train to Neuengamme), 2 February 1945, with "Whittaker, Peter (Brits militair)" ninth of nine names, and the numbers 10 to 17 after it with none (the prisoners page).
• ✓ Sgt Jean Louis Warren, who is on both lists, has a Kew report too. His entry has "Escaped: Germany, 2 February 1945" and, among "Other names mentioned", "Sergeant P Thorne; Sergeant Whittaker" (WO 208/3326/2996).
• ✓ Warren's own report, on the Pegasus Archive, has him in the Landwacht prison at Deventer, where he met Thorne again "and also Sgt. WHITTAKER, R.A.F. who had broken his arm, but the Germans refused him medical aid" (Warren's report).
• ◐ Warren's account of the train reached Col. Glenn E. Duncan, an American evader who met him after his escape and wrote it down on his return in 1945, on a form about Thorne. It names no one else on the train and says nothing of Whittaker; the whole form is on Thorne's page.

Sgt. Warren was in Doetinghem, Gld- Holland prisen with above person. They were on Train moving from the prison to Germany when Sgt. Warren escaped & I later met. Sgt Thorne also jumped from Train but was injured & captured By Germans.

— Col. Glenn E. Duncan, USAAF · War Department Casualty and Missing Persons Questionnaire, in his E&E report 2970 · 1945 · p. 11

• ◐ In his own words, as Wilson prints them, the airmen were kept in prison at Doetinchem for seven weeks, "slowly starving", and "Early in the eighth week of our stay at Doetinghem we were taken by some arbeitscommandodients to the station for entrainment to Hamburg"; the cattle truck had a ventilator about three feet by ten inches, which they prised open and, one by one, climbed through, dropping off the train at about 25 mph (Wilson, p. 133; p. 134).
• Braakman quotes Whittaker's report for the scant food and "a ten-day cold spell of minus 10 degrees with no heating or extra clothes" at the Kruisberg, and himself tells that the train moved off at three in the night of 2 February, Granat jumped first and Thorne followed, caught his overcoat on the carriage, fell and died of his injuries, "Others witnessed the accident" (p. 129); "Seventeen men in total jumped out of the train, including Pete Whittaker and Appie Koeslag" (p. 130).
• Taylor has "Peter Thorne, Peter Whittaker and fifteen others" resolved to escape because they believed they would be executed on arrival; five dropped out that night, the guards firing and missing (p. 436).
• ◐ Where he got off: near Varsseveld, Aalten or Winterswijk, on 1 or 2 February, as the appeal's text of October 1945 has it, which retells his report in the paper's own words (below).
  • His own report as Wilson prints it says how (the ventilator, at about 25 mph, above) but names no place.
  • The list is unfinished, his entry is only rank and number, and our full-name searches of Arolsen's records and the Neuengamme source found no Neuengamme entry for him (no hits for any of his full name forms in arolsen on 4, 13, 14, 15 and 17 October, or in neuengamme on 17 October; the surname alone gave 27 hits in arolsen on 13 and 14 October, none with the given name Peter).

The jump, as the appeal of October 1945 gives his report. In October 1945 Thorne's family and "The Officer Commanding, M.R.E.S., van de R.A.F.", the RAF's Missing Research and Enquiry Service, asked in two Achterhoek papers for news of Thorne, "Waar bleef deze Engelsche vlieger?" (Where did this English airman go?), and gave what Whittaker, "die zich thans weer in Engeland bevindt" (who is now back in England), had reported (De Nieuwsbode, 5 October 1945; De Graafschapper, 5 October 1945, p. 3, under "Uit bange dagen"):

Another sergeant airman, P. Whittaker, identity disc number 1537036, who is now back in England but was then also a prisoner of war, reports however that he met Sergeant Thorne in captivity at Doetinchem. Both were then in the hands of the S.D. This was about the end of January, beginning of February 1945. … On 1 or 2 February they jumped from the train in the area of Varsseveld, Aalten or Winterswijk. Whittaker saw how Sergeant Thorne, whose turn came before his, jumped from the train, landed on his hands and feet, and then nothing more. Then it was his turn. But he landed in a ditch or brook. He wandered about a little and was taken in by a farmer, who gave him shelter on the farm for some days and looked after him.

Dutch originalEen andere vlieger-sergeant, P. Whittaker, nummer identiteitsplaatje 1537036, die zich thans weer in Engeland bevindt, doch destijds ook in krijgsgevangenschap was, rapporteert echter, dat hij sergeant Thorne in gevangenschap te Doetinchem ontmoet heeft. Beiden bevonden zich toen in handen van de S.D. Dit was omstreeks eind Januari, begin Februari 1945. … Op 1 of 2 Februari zijn zij in de omgeving van Varsseveld, Aalten of Winterswijk uit den trein gesprongen. Whittaker zag, hoe sergeant Thorne, die vóór hem aan de beurt was, uit den trein sprong, op handen en voeten terecht kwam en dan niets meer. Toen was het zijn beurt. Maar hij kwam daarbij in een sloot of beek terecht. Hij doolde wat rond en werd opgenomen door een boer, die hem eenige dagen op de boerderij onderdak verleende en hem verzorgde.

— De Nieuwsbode (Doetinchem) · "Waar bleef deze Engelsche vlieger?" · 5 October 1945, p. 1 · the article

• The appeal has a second farmer come to the farm where Whittaker was staying and say that an English pilot called "Peter" had died in his house between 2 and 6 February 1945, near Varsseveld, Aalten, Winterswijk or perhaps Lichtenvoorde, and it asks both farmers to report to the town hall of Wisch at Varsseveld (same article).
• The appeal has him meet Thorne "in gevangenschap te Doetinchem" (in captivity at Doetinchem); ◐ by Braakman and Koeslag Sr's form the two had been taken together at Laren in November 1944 (above), which the appeal does not mention.
• The answer of 9 October, below, put Thorne's death in the hospital at Doetinchem. Thorne's side of the jump is told in full on his page.

Halle and Varsseveld. Two Dutch helpers, three forms; two of the rows type '44 for February, a slip.

• ✓ Evert Jan Berenschot of Halle G 260, Zelhem, born at Halle on 2 December 1892, filled in a form on 5 September 1945.
  • His row is "Ph. Whittaker 1587036 | RAF | Sept. '44, Almen | 3-2- '44, 56 days | Picked up myself | Liberation", and in box 10 he wrote "Hid till the liberation, after that I contacted him with the allies" (p. 7, p. 8; both checked on the images, the number on an enlarged crop).
  • ◐ A man shot down in September 1944 was not hidden from February 1944: we read 3 February 1945.
  • The Americans' summary of 11 January 1946 reads "Provided housing, food and clothing for P. Whittaker, 1587036, RAF, for 56 days" (p. 4, very faint, read on an enlarged crop).
  • A handwritten slip in the file gives "Ph. Whittaker" and a Blackheath Park, London address (p. 3).
• ✓ A second form from the same house, "Berenschot, Evert, Jan", dated 19 December 1945, says that "This man and his son gave food and shelter for 1 English pilot for 8 weeks", and that the family was in great danger because five Germans were billeted in the house at the time. Its row is "P. Whittaker w/o | RAF | Sept. 44, Holland | 3 Feb. 45, 60 | Millendijk (Halle) | Liberated" (p. 2, p. 3; the handwritten copy p. 5; checked on enlarged crops).
• ✓ Derk Willem Mellendijk of E 289 Heelweg, Varsseveld (municipality of Wisch), wrote on 19 December 1945 that "This man gave food and shelter for 1 pilot for 1 night and 1 day". His row is "Whittaker | RAF | Sept 44, Holland | Feb. 44 [sic], 1 | Come by himself | E.J. Berentschot" (p. 2, p. 3; checked on enlarged crops).
• ◐ Read together, he reached Mellendijk, on his own by Mellendijk's account, for one night in February, and Berenschot has him from 3 February, "received from" Mellendijk, until the liberation. That puts him in the Achterhoek about 2 February, the day the Doetinchem lists give for the jump. No form says he had been on the train or how he came to Varsseveld.
• ✓ The answer to the appeal ties the two farms to the man from the train.
  • On 9 October 1945 De Nieuwsbode reported that letters and "zelfs een mondelinge toelichting van de landbouwers Berentschot en Mellendijk op de Heelweg, waar de piloot Whittaker verborgen is geweest" (even a spoken account from the farmers Berentschot and Mellendijk on the Heelweg, where the pilot Whittaker had been hidden) had reached the town hall at Varsseveld (De Nieuwsbode, 9 October 1945, p. 1).
  • From them it was established that Thorne had got out through the hatch of the goods wagon, was badly hurt, and died in the Roman Catholic hospital at Doetinchem (De Nieuwsbode, 9 October 1945; the whole passage is on Thorne's page).
  • De Graafschapper of the same day has the information reaching the Wisch town hall without naming the farmers (p. 2).
• The appeal's farmer who took him in after the jump and sheltered him "eenige dagen" (for some days) is not named in it; ◐ the forms make the first night Mellendijk's and the weeks after Berenschot's. ◐ The answer of 9 October names two farmers, Berentschot and Mellendijk, who may be the very two the appeal asked to come forward, so that one of them was the source of the house story and then gave the hospital version; nothing held says so.
• ◐ Fifty-six days from 3 February ends on 31 March 1945 and sixty on 4 April; no form gives the day of liberation, and Kew's cover sheet for him is dated 1 April 1945 (above).

Liberated. ◐ By his report, as Wilson prints it, he "made across country by the aid of the stars in a generally north west direction" and spent "about seven weeks being fed like a fighting cock on milk, butter and eggs"; Wilson adds that he sheltered in woods overnight, was given food at a farm and taken to another in the "Varesveld area" (Wilson, p. 134). Braakman prints the report more briefly: "spent about seven weeks being fed like a fighting cock", without the stars sentence or "milk, butter and eggs" (Braakman, p. 130). He wrote that "On March 31st I heard the sound of an approaching battle and in the evening went off to meet the troops", and Wilson has him giving the British troops of 43 Division the position of a German 88 mm gun before being passed down to IS9 (Wilson, p. 134; Braakman, p. 130, which has his 31 March in nearly the same words). Taylor has him "given refuge by two Dutch farmers until, on 31st March, he heard the sound of gunfire" and meeting the British troops "next day" (p. 436; p. 635, which has Hengelo's liberation and "Sgt Whittaker, the companion of Peter Thorne"). ◐ Seven weeks from 3 February is 24 March, so the seven weeks are a round figure. By 5 October 1945 he was back in England, by the appeal for news of Thorne (De Nieuwsbode).

Listed missing. The Flight of 22 February 1945 has "Flt. Sgt. P. L. Whittaker" in the Air Ministry's list of airmen missing (✓ initials and rank only, but the same "Missing" list has the rest of NF923's crew in Bateman's table beside him, P/O A. W. Benting, F/O C. E. M. Graham and F/O R. H. Petch, D.F.C., with "Act. Flt. Lt. G. S. Stout, D.F.C."; it also has "F/O. R. D. Ward", for whom see David Ward).

Awards and the squadron.

• ✓ The Distinguished Flying Medal: "1587036 Peter Linn WHITTAKER, R.A.F.V.R., 617 Sqn." among the Flight Sergeants in the Air Ministry's awards of 7 December 1945 (issue 37378, p. 5946; the heading, p. 5945). The Gazette prints no citation or date of the deed.
• ✓ Mentioned in despatches: "Flight Sergeant. 1587036 P. L. WHITTAKER, R.A.F.V.R." in the Air Ministry list of 31 January 1947 (issue 37868, p. 559).
• Wilson has him "eventually" returning to 617 Squadron, "but by that time operations were practically over" (p. 134); Cooper has Rupert and Whittaker both making it back to England, Rupert only in 1945 (p. 100).
• ◐ Taylor, on Peter Thorne, writes that a book by Oliver Clutton-Brock tells the story of "F/Sgt Peter Whittaker DFM, a fellow-POW in Stalag IVB at Mühlberg, whose escape route from the camp crossed several times with Peter Thorne's" (p. 435).
  • The DFM fits the Gazette.
  • ⚠︎ The Stalag IVB does not fit what the other books and the helpers' forms say of him, shot down in September 1944 and in hiding until taken in November: Wilson's "two RAF escapers from Stalag IVB" are men with him (p. 133), and Taylor's own text has Thorne escaping from Stalag IVB in May 1944 and then joining "Peter Whittaker and a group of other escapers on a farm" at Nijverdal, which cannot be a man shot down in September 1944 (p. 435).

No source held says where he lived after the war.

• Whether he went to Neuengamme. ✓ He did not. The Kruisberg list he is on has him among the 17 who left the train (above), and Berenschot and Mellendijk, on their forms of 1945, have him in the Achterhoek from February 1945 to the liberation; Wilson and Braakman have him jumping and Taylor has him one of the five; the appeal of October 1945 gives his report of the jump, and its answer has the two farmers hiding him (De Nieuwsbode, 5 October and 9 October 1945). Two sources point the other way:
  • Sgt Jean Louis Warren, who dropped off the same train, says in his own report that he "heard later" that Thorne "had been wounded and sent back to prison at DOETINCHEM" and that "Sgt. WHITTAKER, R.A.F. had gone on with the train to GERMANY" (Warren's report): hearsay, against Whittaker's own report.
  • Koeslag Sr's questionnaire of 13 July 1945 says of the two English pilots and the Pole taken at the farm that "All three jumped out of the train", while its supplement has "The Pole and Big Peter were released" and "We do not know what happened to Big Peter" (p. 13; p. 15); ◐ Big Peter is Lange Pieter, very probably Whittaker.
  • The list is unfinished, but the only source that sends him on to Germany is hearsay, against his own report and the forms of the two farmers who hid him.
• His number. 1587036 on Berenschot's row and the Americans' summary, on all five Kew entries and in the Gazette twice; 1537036 on the Kruisberg list and, as his "identiteitsplaatje" (identity disc), in the appeal of 5 October 1945 (De Nieuwsbode). ◐ The list may have the number from the appeal or its sources; the foundation does not say. ◐ 1537036 is very probably a one-digit slip: it is the same man by name, rank and service, the Koeslag farm, and the Blackheath Park address on Berenschot's slip and on the Ebbekink and Koeslag forms.
• His job in the crew. Mid-upper gunner in Bateman, Wilson and Cooper, tail gunner in Braakman (p. 107, twice), and Petch is the rear gunner in Bateman and Cooper. ◐ Mid-upper, by three books and the crew table.
• His pilot. Flt Lt G. S. Stout in Bateman's table, Cooper and Wilson. ✓ A "Duffy" and "Ingleby" that an earlier search read from Bateman's page belong to the Mosquito crash of 7 August 1944 printed in the other column of the same page (the page image).
• The aircraft. Lancaster "NF923" in Bateman (p. 122); "MF923" on the IS9 list (the list).
• The crew's fate. Wilson's note has all of Whittaker's crew surviving "with the exception of the pilot and the wounded navigator" (p. 25); Bateman has the engineer Benting killed as well, and Cooper has him dying in hospital at Enschede on the 25th (p. 99). ⚠︎ Not settled.
• The night. Bateman heads the table 24 September 1944, the date of the operation as it ran into the next day; Braakman and the Ebbekink form have the shoot-down on 23 September; Wilson has the raid's attacks "timed to open at 9.20 p.m." (p. 17), and ◐ Whittaker's "2300 by my watch" at the first farm (p. 24) fits the evening of the 23rd.
• When he came down and how long he stayed at Markelo. Ebbekink has 23 to 25 September, three days, and "4 days" in his summary; Schipper has "22-9-44"; Schreurs has fourteen days from 15 or 16 September, which is before both (Ebbekink, p. 3; Schipper, p. 6; Schreurs, p. 7). ⚠︎ Not settled; the forms were filled in a year later from memory. Dinius's Laren table has "Aug.44" for the month he was shot down and "Aug/Nov 44" for his hiding (p. 4); ✗ August, against the raid of 23/24 September and every other form.
• Where he came down. Markelo on the Ebbekink, Schipper and Schreurs forms; Laren on the Koeslag daughter's; Almen on Berenschot's (Koeslag, p. 3; Berenschot, p. 8). ⚠︎ Not settled; Kew's "Captured near Larun" is where he was taken, not where he landed.
• Who gave him to the Koeslags. "Kolkman, Buisweerd, Laren" on Schreurs's form, "v.d. Veen" on the Koeslag daughter's (Schreurs, p. 7; Koeslag, p. 3). ⚠︎ Not settled; they may be two stages of one chain. Dinius's table, from the Laren side, has him received from Kolkman too (p. 4).
• When he was taken, and whether at the farm.
  • Braakman has the raid on the Koeslag farm on 2 November 1944, Taylor 1 November, Wilson "October" (Braakman, p. 109; Taylor, p. 435; Wilson, p. 133).
  • Koeslag Sr's recommendation calls the list of six names, Whittaker's among them, "the only list of pilots which escaped the notice of the S.D. when the farm was attacked" (p. 10), which reads as pilots missed by the raid; his own table has him "made prisoner of war together with Koeslag" (p. 19).
  • ◐ Kew's "Captured near Larun" and the Doetinchem entries, which have him lodged at the raided farm, side with the table; a list can escape notice while its men are taken. Koeslag Sr's questionnaire of 13 July 1945 has the raid on 2 November 1944 and both English pilots captured at the farm (p. 13), which ◐ with Lange Pieter as Whittaker is a 1945 record of Braakman's date and of his capture there.
• How long at Doetinchem. Seven weeks before the train, by Whittaker as Wilson prints him, that is from about mid-December; Taylor has Peter Thorne, who was with him, moved to the Doetinchem SD prison in January 1945. ⚠︎ Not settled.
• The date of the train and how many left it. 1 February (Taylor) or 2 February (Braakman), 1/2 February in the transport list; 17 men in Braakman and the foundation's list, five that night in Taylor. ⚠︎ Not settled.
• The day of liberation. The evening of 31 March in his own report (Wilson, Braakman), the next day (1 April) in Taylor; Kew's cover sheet is dated 1 April 1945. ◐ Evening of 31 March, by his own words.
• How long at Halle. 56 days on Berenschot's first form and the Americans' summary, 60 days on his second, "8 weeks" in its remarks (p. 8; p. 3). ◐ Eight weeks is 56 days; all three are within a few days of each other. The appeal of 5 October 1945 has the farmer who took him in after the jump shelter him "eenige dagen" (for some days) (De Nieuwsbode); ◐ that fits Mellendijk's one night better than Berenschot's weeks, but the appeal names no one.
• Where Mellendijk and Berenschot lived. Berenschot's second row has "Millendijk (Halle)"; Mellendijk's own form has Heelweg, Varsseveld (Berenschot, p. 3; Mellendijk, p. 2). Berenschot's own form has Halle G 260, Zelhem, where De Nieuwsbode of 9 October 1945 has "de landbouwers Berentschot en Mellendijk op de Heelweg", which may place both on the Heelweg or only the hiding place (p. 7; De Nieuwsbode). ⚠︎ Not settled.
• Rank. The Dutch forms have a warrant officer ("W/O Pete Whittaker", Ebbekink); the Kruisberg list a sergeant, and the appeal of October 1945 a "vlieger-sergeant" (sergeant airman) (De Nieuwsbode); Kew, the IS9 list and the Gazette a flight sergeant (the list); Taylor's p. 635 "Sgt".

His part in the Kruisberg transport is told on Captivity and home and The December round-up: Huurdeman has three men of the Achterveld round-up, Johan Verhoef among them, moved to De Kruisberg and put on the same transport (Huurdeman); Whittaker is one of the other Allied names on the Kruisberg list, not from Murphy's party.

Everyone, A to Z