The total wartime losses for the Path Finder Force were given by their commander, Donald Bennett, as being 3,618 men. It was a large figure for a small Force which only came into existence in the fourth year of the war.¹

Today, as in former years, we feature just one of those lost Pathfinders.

Cyril Riches, DFC, was a first-class pilot, who had flown with 97 Squadron since the previous winter before his transfer to 635 Squadron in April 1944. He must have been very close to the end of his tour when his aircraft was shot down on 6 July 1944, causing his death and that of three other members of his original crew. His navigator Henry Watts, who was also killed, was buried with him on the farm of Roger Deram, at Eringhem, a commune in the Nord department of northern France, between Dunkirk and Saint-Omer.

The bodies were moved to their current location in Millam Churchyard in October 1946, as were those of other members of the crew who had hitherto been buried elsewhere. 

For full details of the Riches crew, see the page on our old website: CREW: RICHES

1. Donald Bennett, Pathfinder, p.259. ↩︎