It's a Small World - Stephen Penn Dennis

You'll find this story hard to believe.

My cousin Frank Dennis and his partner Leonie McGuire often work overseas as English teachers and one of their recent postings was to Cambodia in 2011. Leonie is also a keen student of French. She took the opportunity for extra French tuition while in Cambodia, as she and Frank were planning a visit to Neuville Vitasse in France, where Frank's father, Stephen Dennis, was shot down in 1943, during the Second World War. He was flying a Hawker Typhoon, a ground-attack aircraft used for destroying ground installations, communications, transport and tanks.

It came as quite a shock when Leonie's French tutor in Cambodia turned out to be very familiar with that part of France. He made some enquiries and soon contact was established with Philippe Dubron, the grandson of the French farmer who rescued Stephen Dennis after he crash-landed. Philippe initially thought that a phone call from Cambodia about a crash that happened 70 years ago was a prank. Philippe was 7 years old in 1943 and remembered the commotion in his household on that fateful morning.

When Frank and Leonie visited Neuville Vitasse in January 2012, they received an incredible welcome. Philippe Dubron and his wife Evelyne had organized a civic reception hosted by the mayor of Arras. Also present was the mayor of Neuville Vitasse, who accompanied Frank and Leonie on their tour that day, plus a media scrum of local and regional print and radio journalists.

Like many men who suffer in war, Stephen had never said much about his wartime experiences before his death in 1988. The story as his sister Julia knew it was that Stephen had been in action over France, and was turning for home when he was attacked by six Messerschmidts and engaged in a dogfight. Frank says that records show that Stephen had destroyed 5 trains that day, and no wonder the Germans were angry. The last view of Stephen’s plane from an English perspective was that it was seen going down.

The next part of the story has been re-told by my sister Cathryn Gillespie-Jones, Stephen's niece, who has a photographic memory for all the stories told by our grandmother Thea, Stephen's mother:

For some time all that was known back in Australia was that he was missing in action, presumed dead. One day Thea was dusting when she suddenly felt quite strange and dizzy, and sitting down, she experienced what she described as a vision. It was as if she were watching a camera pan down a long hospital ward, where the patients were nursed by nuns wearing very distinctive habits. At the very end of the ward it was as if the camera zoomed into a patient whose face was entirely covered in bandages, and in the close-up, the patient’s eyes were recognisable as Stephen’s. Thea, not unnaturally, was quite overcome by this experience, which she related to her friend and neighbour Woolly (Mrs Willoughby). Woolly asked for a description of the nuns’ habits, and armed with this information, rushed off to see her priest. The priest was able to identify them as being worn by a particular order of nuns in France, and through this information, the Red Cross was able to trace Stephen. He had, indeed, been a patient in the hospital staffed by this order.

Prior to Frank's visit to France, the other information we had was that the German pilot who had shot Stephen down later came to visit him in hospital, bringing Stephen a gift of cigarettes and a pot of honey.

So Frank's visit to Neuville Vitasse was a very moving experience for him, and he gained a lot of new insights into what happened on that fateful day. For a start, Frank discovered that Stephen’s injuries were extensive and a local farmer named M. Guislainn Plomb placed him on a horse-drawn cart lined with straw and took him back to his farm house, a kilometre away. Stephen was placed on a mattress on the kitchen floor and given basic care by Philippe's grandmother and a neighbour. Frank and Leonie visited that farm house where they saw the kitchen where Stephen lay on a mattress until the Germans came. The farm house is unchanged on the outside from how it would have been in 1943.

Frank discovered that two local French historians had obtained eyewitness accounts of his father’s crash. They are adamant that his plane was not on fire and that he made a perfect landing – they report they saw the wheel ruts in the field and that he hit railway tracks, which caused his plane to nose-dive, bringing him to a very sudden stop. He was badly injured but managed to get himself out of the plane without assistance and he staggered 50 metres where he collapsed unconscious

Frank says: It seems likely Dad remained unconscious the whole time he was with the French. They reported that there was nothing to identify Dad, other than a number they found on the collar of his jacket. They claim they used this number to make enquiries at the hospital as to his wellbeing and to later contact Dad in Australia after the war. M. Barbier, who found this number on the jacket (Dad's war service number), was a good friend of Philippe’s grandfather M. Guislainn Plomb, and he helped M. Plomb and Dad maintain regular contact once a year for many years because he spoke good English and translated for M. Plomb. I was previously unaware of this contact.

Some of the press articles about Frank's pilgrimage are online - I found the following stories by Googling "Neuville Vitasse Stephen Dennis". The stories are in French, but rough English translations are available on the web.

www.lavoixdunord.fr/Locales/Arras/actualite/Secteur_Arras/2012/01/05/article_frank-et-leonie-des-australiens-sur-les.shtml

www.nordeclair.fr/Actualite/2012/01/08/un-australien-retrouve-les-sauveurs-de-s.shtml

www.lavenirdelartois.fr/actualite/Pays_d_Artois/CC_Val_de_Gy/2012/01/11/article_deux_familles_liees_par_la_guerre_39_45.shtml

When they returned to Australia, Leonie and Frank did an interview on their local ABC radio station about their recent trip to France. That interview is online. It is also featured on the ABC's Mid North Coast  website and the ABC's Mid North Coast Facebook page.

Frank tells me that his father's wartime experiences have inspired him to research them fully and write them up for the family's benefit. (Stephen Penn Dennis' life as a child is mentioned on pp 278-286 of 'From Buryan to Bondi', available online at BookPOD.)

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