Plt Off. Keith Fereday Glenn (1911 – 1941)

Keith Fereday Glenn was born in Southsea, Hampshire on 29 May 1911, the third of four children of John Fereday Glenn, the manager of a tramway company, and his wife, Ellen Hollis.

In the 1930s, the Glenn family moved to Kent, with father John running a service station in Offham. Keith had found work in Manchester as a salesman in retail tailoring and after war broke out, joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve. On 17 November 1940, he was gazetted pilot officer with 150 Squadron, and his role as observer saw him fly missions into enemy territory on Wellington bombers.

On 16 July 1941, Keith took off with his crew from RAF Snaith in Yorkshire on a nocturnal bombing run over Hamburg. During the night his plane was shot down and crashed near Wedel, Germany with all but one of the six crew members killed. Their bodies were subsequently buried in Hamburg Cemetery.

Shortly after the war Keith’s older brother John Patrick Sydney Glenn moved to Platt and lived for several years with his wife at Nepicar Lodge. It seems likely John had his brother’s name inserted on the war memorial.