It was not without a little trepidation that my dive partner, John Gilmour, and I began to plan our descent into the turbid waters of Lake Erie to view the wreckage of a recently discovered Harvard. The midday sun was trying to break through the thickening clouds as the winds continued to gain strength. The weather forecast had called for 15 knot winds but it seemed more like 25 as the waves began to build to an uncomfortable height. It took several attempts before we were able to successfully set the hook, and I was starting to wonder if I had bitten off more than I could chew. Hand over hand we made our way down the anchor line, our eyes adjusting slowly to the loss of ambient light. Over the years I’ve had the opportunity to dive on many shipwrecks where there had been some loss of life but for the most part these were nameless souls who I felt little connection with. This time it was different.

  His name was William Charles Smith and he was just 17 years of age when his plane failed to recover from a steep dive on that late spring day June 19th 1943. He was on a training mission from his base of operations at the Dunnville Aerodrome, reportedly practicing mock strafing runs on moving targets. Newspaper accounts of the day stated that witnesses aboard the excursion steamer “Canadiana” noticed that the aircraft had been active in the area of the vessel when the accident took place. This ship was a common sight ferrying passengers between Buffalo NY and the amusement park at Crystal Beach, just west of Fort Erie on the lake’s north shore.

The part of the fuselage containing William’s body was eventually recovered off of Windmill Pt. but the rest of the aircraft was never located. John and Maude Smith of Kidmore End, Oxfordshire, England were notified by telegram that their son would never be coming home. Eventually, other war news overshadowed this tragedy and the scene of the accident was forgotten for nearly sixty-five years. That is until John Gilmour and Dan McDermott who, in August 2006, while searching for a local shipwreck stumbled upon the plane’s wreckage in forty feet of water. Now John has been a pilot since 1998 and Dan is a retired commercial pilot so they soon realized that this debris field was not part of a shipwreck at all.

    Once we reached the bottom John inspected the anchor to make sure it had a good hold. Satisfied, he headed off in the direction of the wreck with me hot on his heels, not wanting to get left behind in the gloom. As we made our way along the bottom we soon encountered small bits and pieces of the aircraft. To the right was a section of the leading edge of a control surface while to the left, at the edge of our visibility, was what looked like a magneto. A piece of exhaust ducting that once contained the roar of a 600 HP Pratt and Whitney engine was now the silent home to a family of tiny crayfish. There were a few small gears, some hydraulic lines and shards of shredded aluminum. But there looming in the distance was the unmistakable shape of the engine, its zebra mussel covered blades bent back at an unnatural angle, a testament to the severity of the impact. We quickly scanned the area around the propeller hub searching for the data plate but it was nowhere to be found. The decades underwater had caused significant corrosion to all aluminum parts. The bottom here is mainly composed of flat rock intermingled with small boulders and basketball sized stones. Tiny black gobies were everywhere darting in and out of small openings between the rocks. Small mouth bass, some of which were of considerable size, stood sentinel above us waiting patiently to swoop down on any small morsel of food that might be exposed by our efforts. While I hunted around for any larger pieces John spent the rest of the dive searching in the thin sediment with his metal detector hoping to find that elusive clue that would positively identify the aircraft. John and Dan had located the plane’s landing gear during previous dives but they are widely scattered and weren’t seen during this dive.

     All too soon it was time to return to the surface. As we ascended up the line and the water became brighter and warmer that sense of foreboding I had experienced earlier on was replaced by a feeling of accomplishment - that I was now one of the few people who had experienced the thrill of exploring this unique piece of our aviation heritage. Safely back on the boat the waves didn’t seem as intimidating as we slowly made our way back to shore.      

    L.A.C. William Charles Smith R.A.F.V.R. is buried in Lot 845- Grave #2 at the beautiful Dunnville (Riverside) Cemetery. The cemetery is located on the south side of Hwy #3, adjacent to the Grand River.

     The CHAA dive recovery team has offered its services to the Fort Erie Underwater Recovery Unit as they continue the hunt for further evidence of the aircraft.

Greg Steffler