A MEMORIAL to a Second World War bomber crew member - whose unofficial grave remained undiscovered until recently – is to be unveiled in Germany.

The circumstances surrounding the death of Reginald Renton were unknown to his family and daughter Valerie Renton when he died on a mission to Germany in September 1943.

Sgt Renton had been a bomb aimer with the RAF's 90 Squadron on a Stirling aircraft which had been shot down by German forces, but that was all the information his family had at the time of his death.

That was until Erik Wieman, a former Dutch paratrooper who now lives in Germany, got in contact with the family.

Erik had answered an appeal on the internet from the community news site for Bishop Monkton, trying to find the identity of R Renton named on a village memorial.

He operates a German search team with friend Peter Berker, who find and investigate sites where English and Allied personnel died in Germany. Erik had worked in excavating Roman remains, but switched to allied sites when he realised information about their location was in danger of disappearing, as locating them relies on the memories of local witnesses. The information they find is shared with living relatives and any personal items are passed on.

Erik had found the exact place Sgt Renton’s plane came down in Ludwigshafen after a man in his nineties pointed to the part of the field where the plane had come down on his father’s farmland. Another resident pointed out where the plane’s wing had come down, allowing him to piece together what happened to the bomber in its last moments.

Erik gathered together some pieces of the wreckage – including the bomb release trigger from the aircraft which was the last item Sgt Renton had touched – and last year visited the UK to present the items to his family, staying long enough to attend the village Remembrance Service before flying back to Germany the same day.

Now a memorial stone and plaque is to be unveiled at the site of the crash by the Mayor of Limburgerhof, Dr Kern, on August 5.

Afterwards, a memorial service will take place at the site where all seven crew members of the Stirling EF129 died with descendants of the crew, who came from Canada, New Zealand and the UK.

The memorial stone for the airmen killed in action will be blessed by a member of the clergy from the Diocese of Speyer.

German and English military will also send representatives.

Erik said: “In order to prevent forgotten crash sites and the fates of their respective crews from disappearing from public consciousness, it is our goal to find these historical and fateful places and to provide detailed information to the descendants, who often do not know much about the exact site and events. Our final goal is to set up a memorial stone after the excavation."