Private George R Middleton

Private George R Middleton served with 13th (Lancashire) Battalion the Parachute Regiment (Luard’s Own). He travelled to war with 19 other comrades in a Stirling from RAF Keevil- the aircraft callsigned "H" for "Hellzapoppin".

At 23.48 on 5th June 1944, they took off but the flight was not without incident. As the aircraft neared the coast of France, the German Ack-Ack units were alerted, searchlights started to probe the sky and the flak guns opened fire. 

At 0.40 on D-Day the stick jumped over LZ “N” but there were problems as fellow stick member Private John SURGEY attested … “the pilot aborted the run in by switching on the red light as number 8 of the stick was about to exit, but he still jumped. John SURGEY followed his particular pal "Taffy" PRICE as did Sergeant George KELLY at number 10 and Private Ken LANG number 11. But then jumping stopped and the aircraft with its 6 man crew plus the last 9 members of the stick disappeared. No trace of "H" for "Hellzapoppin" was ever found and the crew and remaining stick were posted Missing in Action (MIA). 

During the whole of D-Day, 13 Para suffered only 15 fatal casualties, 9 of which were accounted for by the loss of “H” for “Hellzapoppin”. One of these 9 was Private George Middleton.

Pte Middleton is commemorated on the Bayeux War Memorial.

Memorial photograph reproduced by kind permission of CWGC.