LT. SAMUEL E. KERSHAW - WORLD WAR II

It had been an American P-51B-15NA plane flying out of Wormingford Air Base in Essex, northeast of London, that was strewed over a 200Â’ area in the English countryside that young Ken Rydings saw in 1945. The plane was burned beyond recognition on WarrenÂ’s Farm. The little village of North Stifford in Essex was no stranger over the previous five years to German, English and American planes flying overhead. But this time it was a plane that had fallen from the sky on February 21, 1945 in daylight hours. More heartbreaking was the fact that the pilot in that American plane had not survived. The young pilot who served with the 55th Fighter Group of the 8th AAF was Lt. Samuel E. Kershaw.

Ken Rydings as a young lad of thirteen years on February 21st in 1945, heard sounds a couple miles away that would affect him then and for years later. He was attending College (the English version of high school) when the scream of a plane diving towards Earth caught the attention of Ken and his classmates. The next sound was an explosion as the plane crashed into the ground. He would not know until later that day how close the plane came to his neighborhood. The American plane and its pilot crashed only 200 yards away from a primary school, which was filled with young children. KenÂ’s own older cousin, who was on leave from the British Air Force, was one of the first people to reach the plane after it crashed. But he quickly realized as the plane was covered in flames, that the pilot could not be saved.

As the war ended later that year, Ken and the family went on to rebuild their lives. Ken finished school and went on to a career and marriage, remaining in the local area of his childhood. The site of the crash stood as open fields, nothing changing for decades. With the beginning of the early 1990Â’s, developers were making plans to create an enormous housing complex covering many acres on and near the crash location. This massive development was to be called Chafford Hundred. Over the coming years as Ken watched this housing project grow with streets laid out and new homes being built, his thoughts went back to February 1945, to the American pilot dying on those very grounds. He felt something should be done to honor that pilot, possibly have a road named in Lt. KershawÂ’s honor.

Part of his efforts included convincing the developers of Chafford Hundred to name a street in Lt. KershawÂ’s honor, which Ken did get formal approval of in 1998. But to locate information on KershawÂ’s family seemed to be the impossible task. One day Ken was reading a copy of the Manchester Genealogical Magazine dated September, 1998, when the surname of KERSHAW caught his attention. It is a common name in west central England but what Ken noticed especially was the inquiry from an American lady living in Stuart, Florida, USA.

This is where I, Alice Luckhardt, now became a new address for Ken to contact. For I had been the one to submit a query on the surname KERSHAW, my maiden name. My first contact with Ken came with a letter postmarked England in September 7, 1998. On opening and reading the letter from Ken, I was truly touched by his sincere and touching concern on getting the well overdue recognition owed this American pilot for his personal sacrifice to preserve England. As Ken stated in his letter, "I started out on my quest knowing only that a crash did occur, it has taken me so long to establish and verify certain facts, . . . what in fact is proving most difficult of all, is to obtain some form of personal profile of Samuel E. Kershaw!". He had tried the US Embassy, Armed Forces magazines, veteran organizations, but with no success. Ken was determined to have the road named in honor of Samuel KERSHAW and that the community being created on the crash site knows what sacrifice was made by this pilot.

Already knowing the names of my own KERSHAW family members in America from the World War II time frame, I knew Lt. Samuel KERSHAW was not a relative. One source I had used many times in my family research, especially for those who had served in the military, was National Personnel Records Center of Military Personnel in St. Louis, Missouri. In November I submitted my request for the military records on Samuel E. Kershaw. There was only a service number that Ken had located that I sent with my request.

Months had passed, finally on January 9,1999 there was a response from the St. Louis Military Records department. Inspecting the couple of photocopies inside revealed the Master Index Card on three Samuel Kershaws. It was the center one, Samuel E. Kershaw, a 2nd Lt. AC that had the key date on it. This Samuel KERSHAW died on February 21, 1945. On reading this I quickly got out my letters from Ken to compare. Sure enough, the death date and the crash date matched. The attached letter from the Military Personnel Records department stated that many military records were lost in a fire at the building in St. Louis back in 1973. This copy of Master Index Card and payroll sheets were the only records they could locate. The only helpful pair of clues was his hometown name of Doylestown, Pennsylvania and his birth date of February 6, 1922. I e-mailed Ken right away with the latest results. He responded with magnificent joy at having some bit of information on Samuel. Ken wrote that, "I commented to my wife that surely somewhere in the USA someone knew and loved him, now I can at least say where he lived, how old (young) he was, etc." to the developers of the housing project. He also intended contacting the Imperial War Museum. Ken went on to state, ". . . I will register this site to Samuel E. Kershaw, so come what may, he will take a place in the Historical records of the War. I am reminded of the First World War poem that includes the line "there is some corner of a foreign field that is forever England", we will have one that will be USA."

We still did not have SamuelÂ’s family. My next thought was to try the Internet for KERSHAW names in Doylestown. I was hoping that some family member may still live in this small Pennsylvania town after 54 years. After just a few minutes, there it was on the computer screen; one person named KERSHAW in Doylestown, a Ms. Mary Lou F. Kershaw, along with a complete address. I sent her a letter the next day, explaining the story of the American pilot in England and how Ken Rydings was looking for family members. Within a week, a letter arrived from Mary. She wrote that her ex-husband, Roy P. Kershaw, was the younger brother of Samuel. Roy was retired to North Carolina. Roy had told her how the family had been very grief stricken on hearing of SamuelÂ’s death in 1945. She included RoyÂ’s mailing address.

Some of the new facts we learned from Roy about Samuel were that the family had been told the plane crashed due to a problem with his oxygen supply. His body was sent back to Pennsylvania and he was buried at the American Legion Cemetery in Doylestown. The town renamed a street in 1945 in honor of their fallen hometown boy. He had flight training in North Carolina, Florida and Alabama before being shipped to England. There was a wife, Winnie Ward, he left behind when he went overseas but they never had children.

Roy wrote of Samuel being his true inspiration in life. Roy has also sent a photograph of his brother in his uniform. Ken now feels he truly knows Lt. Samuel E. Kershaw, even if it was a very short life.



On Friday, September 3, 1999, the road naming dedication was held at Chafford Hundred with Ken Rydings as the guest of honor. He unveiled the plaque before the media, friends and family. This date also marked the 60th anniversary of BritainÂ’s entry into World War II. The plaque and the road were dedicated to Lt. KershawÂ’s memory for his ultimate sacrifice. The street, KERSHAW CLOSE was named for Lt. Kershaw so future generations will know what happened on that small piece of English soil so many years ago.