Aircraft B-17 41-24491 was shot down 9 November 1942 on a mission to bomb the U-Boat pens at St. Nazaire, France. Serving as a Navigator on board, 2Lt Forrest Hartin baled out of the stricken aircraft and landed about 5 miles north-west of St. Nazaire, France. Six crew members were killed and three were made prisoner. Forrest Hartin was the sole member who managed to evade. He was helped in his evasion of capture by French citizens and French members of the Belgian escape network Comète. After landing in parachute in the area NW of Saint-Nazaire, he was guided and sheltered in many locations in France, among which : Fédrun, Six-Croix, Blain, Nantes, Paris, Bayonne, Saint-Jean-de-Luz, Urrugne. Guided across the Pyrénées mountains during the night of 20 December 1942, he was led to San Sebastian, Bilbao, Madrid, Sevilla, ultimately reaching Gibraltar on 18 January 1943, from where he was flown back to England on 26 January 1943. See the full story of his evasion at http://www.evasioncomete.org/fhartinfd.html

Service

Events

Event	Location	Date
Born	Massachusetts, United States	22 December 1914
Enlisted	Camp Edwards, Falmouth, Massachusetts, United States	3 November 1941
as an Aviation Cadet in the Air Corps
Evaded Capture	Various places in France	9 November 1942 – 18 January 1943
Evaded capture and returned to England on 26 January 1943.
Buried	East Cemetery, Manchester, Connecticut, United States	1976
Died	Manchester, Connecticut, United States	24 March 1976