Scott Cochrane still tears up when he imagines the strength it would have taken a 21-year-old boy to trade his life for an entire village.
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But the Wagga songwriter said his trip to that very township of Hamont-Achel in Belgium had “brought it all home”.
Mr Cochrane was inspired to immortalise the valour of Downside’s Robert Bruce Meiklejohn – a World War II pilot – in a ballad he officially launched in April 2017.
Alongside the war hero’s nephew, Mr Cochrane was this year honoured with an opportunity to represent Wagga and play his song at the Belgium town’s 75th anniversary commemoration service.
Awestruck, the singer-songwriter said he had brought back more than memories.
“The people are still extremely proud of the boy from Wagga,” Mr Cochrane said. “It’s still a big deal over there.”
RAAF Flying Officer Meiklejohn had made the fateful decision to stay at the controls of his badly damaged Stirling EF-366 as it plummeted to the ground on June 22 in 1943.
German fighter planes had attacked and crippled the World War II aircraft, while it was on a bombing mission.
With no hydraulics, Meiklejohn told his crew to bail out, braced his feet against the controls and used brute strength to steer his careening plane away from the homes below.
Witnesses claim they saw the “burning cross”, carrying fuel and bombs, turn a full 40 degrees to disappear in a mushroom cloud of fire and smoke in a paddock nearby.
Mr Cochrane said nothing compared to standing in the village the Downside pilot had died to save and holding the scorched remains of the plane that became his coffin.
“We stood across the road from the same church spire he tipped his wing to avoid,” Mr Cochrane said.
“We heard about the stories before we went over, but when you look up and you can physically see what he must have done to keep that thing in the air … it’s amazing.”
Stuart Meiklejohn said he had always admired his uncle’s actions, but hearing thanks from the surviving crew’s descendants was something else entirely.
“You hear someone say: ‘Because of your uncle, we are alive’ … that really hits home too,” Mr Meiklejohn said. “That was pretty special.”
After their tour of war in Europe, the Wagga men returned with a renewed mission.
To continue The Captain 366 project, the pair announced plans to plant trees and mount plaques in Downside, honouring the 15 men who were killed during World War I and World War II.
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