Robert Douglas Strong

Bob Strong was a grandson of John Strong, an Englishman who settled in Islington in the 1860s and farmed land between Islington and Kipling Avenues where the St. George's club house is situated today. In 1909 the golf club was established and by 1911 John and three of his children were living at 139 Sunnyside Avenue near High Park. Three of his sons, Henry Francis, William and John Jr and a daughter, Lillie, relocated to Lambton Mills and were living in a house on the south side of Government Road in 1914. It was probably number 43, on the corner of Walford Road. The brothers worked in the building trades.

Henry, born in 1887, was a bricklayer and most likely met his wife, Euphemia Eccles when she visited her brother who lived in Islington. Euphemia was born in 1888 on a farm in Dromore, Ontario, a farming community several kilometres northeast of Mount Forest in western Ontario. The couple wed in Euphemia's church, the Presbyterian church in Holstein, Ontario on September 30, 1913.

They moved into a building on the north side of Dundas Street and welcomed a son, John, likely in 1915. Bob was born next, on February 28, 1918 and the couple's youngest son, Burton was born in 1919. Bob started school at Lambton Mills in September 1924 and other than the removal of his tonsils and adenoids when he was 10, his childhood was uneventful. His family in 1930 was living upstairs at 4158 Dundas Street West and ran a confectionery shop below. Euphemia may have been running the business as early as 1920 while Henry continued bricklaying.

At Lambton Mills school, it was apparent that Bob was an athlete. When he started high school at Etobicoke in September 1932, he won a spot on the school's rugby team. He played hockey for the Kingsway Lambton Junior and Intermediate teams (presumably this was a neighbourhood or a church league), softball in the Etobicoke Intermediate League and baseball. He was a member of Etobicoke High School's football team, but he shone on the school's rugby teams. Legendary journalist Gordon Sinclair, who lived in Islington, trumpeted in The Toronto Star the glories of the Etobicoke team during the senior Etobicoke/Mimico match on October 18, 1936. Etobicoke trounced Mimico 20 to 1. The team had won all seven games of the season and had only been scored on twice. Wrote Sinclair: “In the third, Bob Strong smashed through the defenders who were trying to protect Mike Religa while he kicked, blocked the punt and fell on it for a touch which Fleming converted.” He later wrote: “McCloskey and Strong are a pair of plungers who practically come with a guarantee tied to their shirts. A guarantee that they'll make yards.” In 1935 Bob had received a concussion in a rugby game and lost his memory for a couple of hours, but otherwise his athletic career was injury free.

When Kingsway-Lambton United church opened in 1937, the Strongs joined. Bob became president of the Kingsway-Lambton Amicus United Church Bible Class in the late 1930s and was Vice President of the church's Young People's Club in the early 1940s. In 1937 he became a carrier for The Globe and Mailand was an Honour Carrier which won him a trip to the paper's carriers' summer camp in Port Dover in August 1939. By the early 1940s Bob was also the membership officer of the Knights of the Round Table study group in Islington.

With all his extra-curricular activities, academics took a back seat and Bob finally left Etobicoke with his junior matriculation and a course in Bookkeeping in June 1939 at the age of 21. His mention in The Globe's Honor Carrier Boys column landed him a job as a clerk with a Bay Street stockbroker, F. H. Deacon and Co. Ltd., starting on January 2, 1940. He continued his paper route until the end of 1940. By 1940 the Strongs had moved to 4166 Dundas Street West and by 1942 were living at 106 Government Road.

The Globe and Mail, December 18, 1939. The article which led to Bob's job with F. H. Deacon & Co. Ltd.

Bob became a private in the Etobicoke Civil Guard in August 1940. He began the 48th Highlanders' 30 day basic training course in January 1941 which took place in Long Branch. In March he tried to join the RCAF, but he had varicose veins. After he had his legs treated in March and April, the RCAF accepted his application on May 2. He wrote that he didn't wish to return to his job after the war, preferring to find a job in outdoor electrical work.

Unlike most Toronto RCAF recruits, who did their basic training on the Exhibition grounds, Bob entrained for St. Hubert, Quebec, south of Montreal, for the course there. He started on May 5 and upon completion, he was sent to Trenton on June 9, most likely for guard duty until the next Initial Training course began. On July 16 he began the course in Toronto on the old Toronto Hunt Club land near Eglinton Avenue and Avenue Road. The course he took was geared to observers who were potential navigators, gunners and bomb aimers. Usually this course was used to sort the pilot material from the observers, but in Bob's case, he may have asked not to be considered for the pilot program. At the time the RCAF was only considering licensed pilots and university graduates for their pilot candidates and possibly Bob wanted to join up in the only capacity available to him. His courses included Math, Armaments, Signals, Drill and Law and Discipline. He completed the course on August 20 with 86% and his instructors considered him “calm and cool.”

The next day he reported to the Exhibition grounds, once again until his next course began. Less than two weeks later, on September 2 he entered the Air Observers School in London, Ontario. The program would be eight weeks long followed by a month at Bombing and Gunnery School and finally one month at Navigation School. At London, he flew in Anson aircraft. When he attended Bombing and Gunnery School in Fingal, Ontario, near St. Thomas, he flew in Fairey Battle light bombers and on January 3, 1942 Bob earned his observer badge. Two days later he reported to the Air Navigation School in Pennfield Ridge, New Brunswick, on the south coast of the province, overlooking the Bay of Fundy. The rugged and often foggy coastline gave the airmen conditions similar to those in Southern England. Once again he was training on the Anson aircraft. The course was mainly astronavigation and Bob graduated on February 2, leaving for Toronto the next day for his two week embarkation leave.

Avro Anson. From www.silverhalkauthor.com via Tom Walsh.

Bob reported back to the Maritimes, to Halifax, on February 16 and on the 28th he embarked for Britain, arriving on March 9. The RCAF transferred him to the RAF but he, like all RCAF personnel arriving in Britain, was sent to the Personnel Reception Centre in Bournemouth to await his assignment. He spun his wheels there until May 11, when he was sent to the Air Observer and Navigation School on what is today's Wolverhampton Airport. Bob took courses which focused on navigation topics relevant to Britain and western Europe and once again flew in Anson airplanes.

On June 9, he reported to No. 22 Operational Training Unit (OTU) at Wellesbourne Mountford, 10 kilometres east of Stratford-Upon-Avon. The unit trained crews to fly on the Wellington bomber, the main Allied night bomber at the time. In the first few days, Bob joined the crew of pilot Murray Edward White, a 20 year old from Centreville, New Brunswick. Their navigator was Robert Harvey Ward, 22, from Edmonton. Lanark, Ontario's Walter Raymond Affleck was their 19 year old wireless operator and John William Albert Dorsett, an RAF member from Surrey was their 25 year old air gunner. Bob was the bomb aimer/air gunner in the nose of the plane. The crew completed the course and were assigned to RAF 156 Squadron on August 21.

The squadron was based at RAF Warboys, having arrived there only a couple of weeks before Bob and his crew did. The airbase was located 20 kilometres northeast of Cambridge. The unit flew Wellingtons and was one of the first pathfinder squadrons which flew in advance of an attack, dropping flares to indicate the targets for the following aircraft. The squadron's Wellingtons also carried small bomb loads.

Unlike some squadrons which trained new crews for several weeks before making them operational, 156 Squadron placed each of Bob's crew on other crews' sorties to get accustomed to battle. Bob's first mission was to Bremen with a pilot P.E.W. Mayhew on September 4. They took off at 0010 hrs and all was fine until 0125 when the Wellington was caught in flak over the Dutch island of Texel. Mayhew took evasive action, dropping the plane from 11,000 feet to 5,000 feet, but “was unable to regain operational height,” according to the squadron record. The sortie was abandoned at 0136 hrs and the bombs were jettisoned over the North Sea. For Bob, it must have been a baptism of fire.

He flew two more less exciting missions, one on September 8 and a second sortie with Mayhew on September 10. Finally Murray White's crew was together on September 13 for a mission to Bremen. They departed at 0020 hrs, dropped their bombs at 0234 hrs from 16,000 feet and returned to RAF Warboys at 0505 hrs. They flew their next mission on September 16 but had to return to base due to starboard engine failure.

In October they only flew one mission, on the 13th and then two more in November. All of the targets were German, but on November 28 it was the factories of Turin, Italy. They continued on missions to bomb Germany and Turin. The squadron summary noted on December 31 “3 Lancs arrived for conversion training.” More Lancasters began arriving and most of January 1943 was spent getting comfortable flying the plane. It was a four-engined bomber and could carry much larger bombs than the Wellington. The crews increased by two, adding a flight engineer and an extra gunner. For Bob's crew, they added RAF members Clement Roland Swift as their flight engineer and 20 year old gunner Jack Neale from Lancashire.

The squadron's first mission flying Lancasters was on January 26 and the target for Bob's crew was Lorient, France, to bomb the U-Boat base and the port. They left at 1830 hrs, dropped their bombs at 2030 hrs from 16,000 feet and returned safely to base at 2250 hrs. Flying in the winter caused the guns to freeze up or icing concerns, but on the February 4 mission to Turin, ice was the least of their worries. The Lancaster departed at 1820 hrs and Bob dropped its bomb load at 2140 hrs from 15,000 feet. Soon after, according to the squadron record, “Moderate heavy flak. A burst of which hit our A/C (aircraft), one large splinter pierced the main plane, the port inner tank and damaged the petrol jettison gear and valve.... Had great difficulty in crossing the Alps and had to jettison everything loose to maintain height. About 500 gals of petrol were lost but landed at Ford with 15 mins of petrol left.” For this feat of bravery, pilot Murray White was awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal on February 17.

Avro Lancaster bomber. From wrecksite.eu.

Position of the bomb aimer in a Lancaster. Imperial War Museum.

The crew continued bombing German and French targets. By March 3, navigator Robert Ward's 23rd birthday, Bob had racked up 21 successful missions. On March 5, he added another after bombing Essen. On March 8, the squadron was tasked with hitting Nuremberg, Germany and deployed 9 Lancasters. The Allies sent 335 bombers out to Nuremberg that night. Bob's Lancaster took off at 2015 hrs and nothing was heard of it after take off. The crew was considered missing, presumed dead until 1947 when, with German crash records, it was determined that their Lancaster crashed in the centre of Nuremberg, on Farberstrasse. Bob and his crew are buried in Durnbach War Cemetery. Of the 62 men in Bob's OTU course, 38 were killed in action, 5 became prisoners of war and one evaded capture.

Bob's grave in Durnbach War Cemetery. From The Canadian Virtual War Memorial.

Henry and Euphemia moved to a newly built house at 99 Government Road in the late 1940s and Henry passed away there in 1948. In the 1950s, Euphemia moved back to her family in western Ontario where she died in 1977.