Branch of Service

Air Force

Conflict

World War II (1939-1945)

Date of Enlistment

27/05/1940

Place of Enlistment

Sydney NSW

Gender

Male

Date of Birth

02/04/1918

Place of Birth

Sydney NSW

Address (at enlistment)

31 Monaro Crescent, Griffith, Canberra ACT

School(s) Attended

Telopea Park Primary School (1924-27); St Christopher's Roman Catholic School, Manuka, Canberra ACT (1928-?); St Patrick's College, Goulburn NSW

Occupation

Public servant

Next of Kin

Son of Francis Joseph and Edith Clowry, of 31 Monaro Crescent, Griffith, Canberra ACT; brother of 402083 Warrant Officer Thomas Philip Clowry RAAF (who was a POW in Germany), 72047 Corporal Paul Joseph Clowry RAAF, Patricia (Mrs Frank Boyle).

Burial Place

Body never recovered.

Service Number

402110

Final Rank

Sergeant

Final Unit

RAAF, attached to 38 Squadron RAF

Died 13 July 1941 aged 23 years, presumed dead, killed in action in a flying battle in the Middle East, off Benghazi Harbour.

AWM Roll of Honour, Canberra ACT: Panel 120.
Alamein Memorial, Egypt: Column 245

Frank Clowry had arrived in Canberra from Braidwood by 1923 and in 1924 he and his family were the first tenants of Cottage 16 Westlake which was close to Parliament House, where Frank Clowry was the foreman carpenter in the joiners' shop. In 1931 the family moved to Monaro Crescent, Griffith, Canberra ACT. Felix Clowry worked for the Census office before enlisting in May 1940 and was also a member of the Canberra Aero Club. He embarked for the Middle East in January 1941 and flew bombing missions over Benghazi and Tobruk. His Wellington bomber took off at 21.10 hours on the night of 13/14 July 1941 to bomb Benghazi Harbour but it failed to return. Other pilots on the bombing mission reported seeing an aircraft on fire in the sea about one mile off Benghazi Harbour. No bodies were recovered.

The Alamein Memorial forms the entrance to the El Alamein War Cemetery. The Air Forces panels commemorate more than 3,000 airmen of the Commonwealth who died in the campaigns in Egypt, Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Greece, Crete and the Aegean, Ethiopia, Eritrea and the Somalilands, the Sudan, East Africa, Aden and Madagascar, who have no known grave.

Australia. Department of Veterans' Affairs. World War 2 nominal roll. <http://www.ww2roll.gov.au/>
Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Debt of Honour Register. <http://www.cwgc.org/cwgcinternet/search/>
AWM Roll of Honour and Roll of Honour Circulars http://www.awm.gov.au/database/roh.asp
Ann Gugler. The builders of Canberra 1909-1929... Canberra, 1994 (p.219)
Ann Gugler, 'True tales from Canberra's vanished suburbs of Westlake, Westridge & Acton', 1999 (pp. 161-163)
Nauenberg, Miriam. Index to Telopea Park Primary School: Register of admissions 1923-1946. Typescript compiled for the Heraldry & Genealogy Society of Canberra.
Telopea Park Primary School: Register of admissions 1923-1946. Volume (a): Boys. Photocopy MS held by Heraldry & Genealogy Society of Canberra.
NAA RecordSearch
The Canberra Times - 22 May 1940, 27 January 1941, 17 July 1941, 4 August 1942