We went to the IBCC yesterday to remember one of my wife's relatives Jack Lister who died serving in Bomber Command in 1941, we placed a single poppy next to his name on the commemorative wall,
Opened in April of this year The International Bomber Command Centre (IBCC) is an interpretation centre and memorial relating the historical impact of and on Bomber Command during the Second World War, The central spire is encircled by walls carrying the names of all 57,871 men and women who gave their lives whilst serving in or supporting Bomber Command. This is the only place in the world where all these losses are memorialised.
The IBCC is creating a digital archive on Bomber Command integrating oral histories, photographs, diaries, letters and service records much of which has never been available for public access. The archive will also reference other digital archives and will work with a wide variety of institutions worldwide to digitise their physical archives. The archive also incorporates the Losses Database which carries over 3 million pieces of data on those who died, both resources are available, free, on the project's web site (Losses Database) its already live and we have used it to research the lost of Jack's aircraft. https://internationalbcc.co.uk/
@louannwarren Thank you Lou Ann, my wife got interested in genealogy a few years ago and the story of Jack Lester was mentioned by her mum, she could only managed to find a little information we visited his grave some years back there was only limited in formation on his war grave head stone, now we have a full copy of the crash information and the names of others on board that also lost their lives, its an amazing archive full of interesting information and its free to all:)
@Dawn Thank you very much Dawn, it was something we had planned to do once the centre was completed, although Jack died before my wife was born she still found it very moving:)
@onewing Thank you Babs after the war Bomber Command was viewed in a very different light, not one memorial was erected to remember the men and women of Bomber Command in fact the first official one is The Royal Air Force Bomber Command Memorial in Green Park, London, opened: 28 June 2012,
The IBCC £16million building cost was almost wholly funded by private donations, plus The Heritage Lottery Fund contributed £3.1million of funding, £2.1 million through the British governments Chancellor's LIBOR fund.
June 26th, 2018
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The IBCC £16million building cost was almost wholly funded by private donations, plus The Heritage Lottery Fund contributed £3.1million of funding, £2.1 million through the British governments Chancellor's LIBOR fund.