A young Canadian airman, Ross Bell Nairn, disappeared over Germany in 1944. Evidence of a war crime was uncovered and surreptitiously removed. And then a body mysteriously appeared.
About a year ago, after reading The Job to Be Done by Clint L. Coffey, I found myself going down the proverbial rabbit hole, thanks to a tangential story mentioned in the book.
The story of Pilot Officer Ross Bell Nairn, a young airman from 405 Pathfinder Squadron, could have piqued my interest for the simple fact that he hailed from Science Hill, Ontario, a tiny farming community just outside of St. Mary’s, near my own hometown of Sarnia.
I could also attribute my interest to what I would describe as a soft spot for the stories of those who left this world without descendants and, were it not for serendipity, would have remained largely forgotten.
But there was more to this story that drew me in and wouldn’t let me go: it involves a man stumbling across evidence of a war crime deep in a German forest; the curious removal of said evidence; a certain ambiguity surrounding a tomb in France; and—especially troublesome—a grieving mother and father who went to their graves without knowing the fate of their son.
Continue reading “Buried in Uncertainty: A Vanished Airman, a War Crime, and the Forgotten Mystery that Remains”
