RCAF Sergeant Melvin Toman “Tom” Ditson, the crew’s 29-year-old mid-upper air gunner, was born in Stayner, Ontario on February 20, 1915.
Ditson began six weeks of training at #10 Bombing and Gunnery School at RCAF Mount Pleasant on Prince Edward Island alongside future crew mate Douglas Hicks on February 28, 1944 and qualified as an air gunner on May 17th.
Ditson was injured during the crew’s raid on Pforzheim on February 23, 1945 and would find himself at the No. 16 Canadian General Hospital in Marston Green recovering from a double fracture of the right scapula. This would mark Ditson’s last flight with his crew.
After arriving back in Canada in early summer 1945, Tom Ditson continued his recovery for a short time in a rest home and by November 1945, was working as a foreman for Goodyear. In 1947, the company sent Ditson to their St. Mary’s Ohio Pliofilm plastic wrap plant to learn about the technology and assist in getting production underway at a new plant. It was in the Ohio plant that Ditson would meet his future wife, Marilyn. The two married on July 29, 1950 in Auglaize County, Ohio.
Tom Ditson passed away in a car accident October 1965 in Port Credit at the age of 50, leaving behind his wife Marilyn, his son Wayne and daughter Karen. A second daughter, Lynn was born a month later.
The Harris Crew 