Date:	Friday 25 November 1938
Time:	day
Type:	Fairey Battle Mk I
Owner/operator:	63 Sqn RAF
Registration:	K7567
MSN:	F.2325
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 1 / Occupants: 3
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Plain's Wood, East Tisted, near Alton, Hampshire -   United Kingdom
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Upwood, Huntingdonshire
Destination airport:	RAF Odiham, Hampshire
Confidence Rating:	Information is only available from news, social media or unofficial sources

Narrative:
Fairey Battle Mk.1 K7567, 63 Squadron, RAF Upwood: Written off (destroyed) 25/11/38 when 63 Squadron suffered its first fatal accident, when Pilot Officer John Ellis, flying Fairey Battle K7567, was killed when he crashed at Plain's Wood, East Tisted, near Alton, Hampshire. Trying to locate the Odiham pundit (or flashing beacon) he flew too low and hit a wooded hillside. One of the three crew was killed:

Pilot Officer John Ellis (pilot, aged 21) killed
Corporal Arthur Robert James Thorogood injured
AC2 Victor Douglas Rawlings injured

Being thrown from the aircraft was possibly AC.2 Victor Rawlings’s saviour, the likely hood of being killed himself higher had he not been. On the 16th December [1939], in a ceremony attended by the station staff, P/O Ellis’s ashes were scattered over the airfield, the procedure being carried out from another Fairy Battle from the squadron. According to the official Air Ministry announcement in "Flight" magazine (December 8, 1938 page 525 - see link #3):

"FLYING ACCIDENTS
P/O John Ellis (pilot) lost his life, A/C.2 Victor Douglas Rawlings was dangerously injured, and Cpl. Arthur Robert James Thorogood was seriously injured in an accident which occurred at East Tisted, Alton, Hants, on November 25 to an aircraft of No. 63 (Bomber) Squadron, Upwood, Huntingdon."

The reported crash location of East Tisted is a village and civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is 4.8 miles (7.7 km) south of Alton on the A32 road, at approximate coordinates 51.08515°N 0.99984°W.

1. The K File - The RAF of the 1930s (James J Halley, Air Britain, 1995 p.125)
2. The Battle File (Sidney Shail, Air Britain, 1997 p.125)
3. Royal Air Force Aircraft K1000-K9999 (James J. Halley, Air Britain, 1976 page 62)
4. http://www.rcawsey.co.uk/Acc1939.htm
5. https://www.flightglobal.com/FlightPDFArchive/1938/1938%20-%203441.PDF
6. http://www.rafupwood.co.uk/preparing%20for%20war.html
7. https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/280128/
8. https://aviationtrails.wordpress.com/2020/08/15/raf-upwood-trail-17-the-graveyard-of-raf-squadrons-part-1/
9. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Tisted

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
19-Mar-2018 21:19	Dr. John Smith	Added
20-Nov-2018 19:46	Nepa	Updated [Operator, Operator]
29-Oct-2020 23:10	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Source, Narrative]