Source: Radio New Zealand
The watch found in Germany. Supplied
When Tom Metcalfe left for England to fly bombers in the second world war, he took a watch given to him by his parents for his 18th birthday in 1941.
His little sister Sandra was just 12 when he left. She is now 97, and does not like to talk on the phone. Her daughter Louise Taylor, who lives with her in Kaitaia, told First Up Sandra’s memories of her brother leaving are tinged with sadness: “She didn’t see him after that.”
Metcalfe and his crew were killed when their Wellington bomber was shot down near the German city of Cologne as they returned from a night raid in September 1942.
Their bodies were buried near Cologne before being moved to the Rheinberg war cemetry.
Years, possibly decades later, a local man found a mangled watch with an inscription in English. “Tom, from Dad and Mum”, with the date 18th of July 1941.
After the man died, his widow saw Uwe Benkel being interviewed on TV about his work identifying servicemen who were missing in action. Benkel’s helped recover more than 150 aircraft, including the remains of 60 missing crew members. It was a deeply personal mission for Benkel. Two of his uncles were killed on the eastern front in World War Two, he was able to locate the grave site of one shortly before his father’s death.
“When I told him where his brother is buried in the cemetery in Russia, he was crying like a little kid,” Benkel told First Up.
He was tasked with finding the owner of the watch, but was incorrrectly told it was from a Wellington bomber that had crashed much later in the war.
“I didn’t get a connection from the crash to the watch, so I kept the watch in my archives until nine years later,” he said.
On the other side of the world, New Zealander Paul Kercher was doing his own research. Kercher’s great uncle Walter was another casualty of the Second World War.
Walter had been a frontgunner in a Wellington bomber, and several years ago Kercher found an online article stating Walter’s plane had crashed near Cologne, with a reference to a watch being found years later.
Late last year, Kecher found another German website with details of the crash, including his great uncle’s death certificate. Through that he got in touch with Manfred Weichert, another german crash researcher, and Benkel.
They were able to work out the flight number, and the crew list. The pilot was listed as Thomas Metcalfe, and his birthday matched the date on the watch.
“All of a sudden those pieces connected like a puzzle,” said Benkel.
The next task, establishing if Metcalfe had any surviving relatives. Kercher put a post on the New Zealand Remembrance Army Facebook page.
Soon he was in touch with Greg Bennett, Tom’s nephew, who then put him in touch with Louise and Sandra, Tom’s sister.
The precious watch was currently on its way to Kercher from Germany. Kercher planned to personally hand it to Tom’s sister Sandra this month, with Anzac Day a distinct possibility.
“It’s still hard for us to believe” said Louise Taylor. “I think it’ll be more believable for us when we actually get it in our hands.”
For Benkel, he was glad the watch could finally be returned: “We don’t make no difference if it was Germans, Americans, British, New Zealand, because they all were young guys and they had to fight and they had to give the only thing they had, they gave their lives.”
Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
