Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Warrant Officer William Wallace Collens 401184 RAAF and Flight Sergeant Dudley Francis Fulford 406975 RAAF of 464 Squadron RAAF were killed when Ventura AJ169 was shot down into the North Sea off the coast of Holland

Also killed were Flight Sergeant Cole R/87628 RCAF and Sergeant Lush 1376013 RAF

Their bodies were not recovered and they are commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial

William Collens was born on the 12 May 1914 in Castlemaine Victoria, the eldest son of Eugene and Catherine Collens. Known as Bill he left school at the age of 14 and found work in a gold mine near Lancefield.

He later worked for Eclipse Radio in Melbourne and attended Working Men's College in the evenings.

In 1935 the Collens family moved to Kyabram and Bill took on a position with G Ruler and Co Stock and Station Agents.

Bill was well over six feet tall and a very handy fast bowler in cricket. He was selected to play in a Victorian Country XI to play against the English Ashes tourists in 1936.

On the 4th of January 1941 he enlisted for service with the Royal Australian Air Force. By then 26-year-old Collens had been serving in the Militia for a year and a half and was a member of Fourth Division Signals. He began training as an air observer attending air observers school and bombing and gunnery school at Evans Head and advanced navigation school at Parkes.

On the 23 August 1941 Bill Collens married Annie Thelma Rutherford known as Thelma to whom he had been engaged since March. Not long after the wedding on the 16 November 1941 he embarked for overseas service as part of the Empire Air Training Scheme. His parents moved to Cobram Victoria at this time.

He was one of almost 27,500 RAAF pilots, navigators, wireless operators, air gunners and flight engineers who throughout the course of the war joined Royal Air Force squadrons or Australian squadrons based in Britain.

Having travelled to the United Kingdom in early February 1942 Collens joined number 42 Operational Training Unit based at RAF Andover in Hampshire.

After training as a member of crew for multi-engine aircraft operations in mid-June Collens transferred to number 114 squadron RAF. Part of Bomber Command number 114 squadron flew night attacks using Bristol Blenheim light bombers.

Collens left the squadron transferring to the newly established number 464 squadron RAAF which officially formed in September 1942 at RAF Feltwell, Norfolk under the Empire Air Training Scheme. Equipped with Lockheed Ventura light bombers the squadron joined Number 2 Group of Bomber Command.

Its first operation an attack on the Phillips radio factory at Eindhoven in the Netherlands on the 6 December 1942 characterized its method of carrying out precision raids against point targets.

In daylight attacks the squadron flew in close formation across the English Channel at low level to avoid detection by enemy radar and then climbed quickly to their bombing altitude of ten thousand feet, swiftly diving again to sea level after the attack and leaving their escort to prevent pursuit. Losses were generally light on these ‘tip and run’ raids but on many occasions, aircraft were badly damaged.

Collens was injured during his first operation and spent some time in hospital recovering.

On 4 April 1943 12 Venturas took off from RAF Methwold to bomb the docks at Rotterdam in Holland. There was considerable opposition over the target area with heavy and accurate flak and several aircraft were damaged. Collens’s aircraft was hit over the target area but continued in formation until close to the Dutch coast when it lagged behind, lost height and eventually ditched.

The aircraft was believed to be finished off by enemy fighters. A search sent out later in the day was unsuccessful and all crew members were presumed to have died. His three crewmates were an Englishman, a Canadian and another Australian. Their names are commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial.

Bill Collens was just short of his 29th birthday years of age when he died. Bill also had a younger brother in the RAAF, 418072 Flying Officer Robert Steel Collens, who flew with 179 Squadron RAF, based at Gibraltar. That squadron destroyed 11 U-boats during the war and Robert returned to his parents in Cobram in late 1945.