The latest and ? greatest incarnation.  I was not sure whether to upgrade and certainly the sums for subscribing to Photoshop CC were not convincing. £102.84 per year vs £59 for the upgrade which I can keep forever.

You do get Photoshop CC included and lightroom mobile, but my heavy lifting on the Mac is now in the very capable hands of Pixelmator which keeps going from strength to strength.

What made up my mind to upgrade to ver 6? Simply —  security.

I noticed 2 photos of the Falklands that would work well as a pano, but when I wanted to export them to Photoshop CS3 (my old and trusted out of date version), I was told that I would need to load an old version of Java. Sadly, that is a no-no.  Java is so prone to hacking and thus your machine will be insecure.  

So PSCS3 is now off the menu bar and Pixelmator will do the job.

LR6 also will do HDR and panos – and certainly with panos, does a great job.  My HDR workflow uses Nik software effects and I can make lots of different flavours of HDR.  I will try out the LR6 HDR to see how that works in practice.

LR6 is also supposed to be faster – as it uses the graphics processor – not too sure if that is noticeable in real life. The change to Metal on OS X promises great improvements in speed.  Pity that Adobe were not on the stage at WWDC on Monday to show off their software with Metal

Linda and I visited Reichswald Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery during a battlefield tour with 201(N) Fd Hosp in September 2011. We did not realise at the time that Linda’s mum’s cousin, Denison, was buried in this cemetery.

On our return, we found this out and checked online sources about his burial site and the mode of his death.

Here is what we found:

Birth: 6/5/1917

Death: 20/12/1942

Sergeant (Flt. Engr.), Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve. Age: 25.

*Service no 983068

Burial:

Reichswald Forest War Cemetery

Kleve, Klever Landkreis

Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

Plot: 2. G. 6.

Created by: CWGC/ABMC

Record added: Aug 06, 2010

Find A Grave Memorial# 56032805

On St Michael’s Church Edinburgh war memorial

I hope this information is useful in your research; please quote ‘BOMBER

COMMAND DT570’ in all correspondence.

Here is the information from my database:-

SERIAL : DT570 * Please quote this in all correspondence *

DATE : 20-Dec-1942 / 21-Dec-1942

UNIT : 76 Sqdn

AIRCRAFT : Halifax II

RAF BASE : Linton-On-Ouse

TAKE-OFF AT : 17:41

CODES : MP:R

TARGET : Duisburg

Denison Brierley was the Flight Engineer of a Halifax B.II, serial DT570, code MP-R, based at Linton-on-Ouse. He was killed when the plane was shot down at 17:41 near Weeze while participating in a raid on Duisburg which took place on the night of 20th/21st December 1942.The plane was shot down by the German night-fighter ace Oberleutnant Knacke. The Halifax must have broken up in the air as a large part of the tail section came down near to a farm building, just outside the town of Weeze, the cockpit came down on a road junction in Weeze itself,about 400 meters from the tail section, and the rest came down a further 300 meters away, on or very near to the railway line going towards the town of Goch.

The crew members were :

• Squadron Leader Raymond Newport Peace DFC, Pilot
• Warrant Officer, Second Class Edmund George Jones RCAF, Co-Pilot
• Sergeant Denison Brierley, Flight Engineer
• Sergeant Jack Edgar Novelli Warner, Navigator
• Sergeant Cecil Robert Ray, Bomb Aimer
• Sergeant Leonard Edward Herbert, Wireless Operator/Air Gunner
• Flight Sergeant Austin Roy O’Dell RCAF, Gunner
• Sergeant Frederick Gilder, Gunner

We wished to return and visit his grave to remember him.

So, Linda and I and her sister June and husband Ian organised a battle field visit that would start with a visit to his grave, lay a wreath and honour his companion crew on his Halifax who died with him.

Dennis, Linda’s brother (who is named after Denison) had a letter from Chrissie, Linda’s mum This was sent to Denison on 2 December 1942, but was never delivered (he died on 20 December) and the letter was returned to sender. We therefore resolved to deliver this letter to Denison at last …

Our visit took place on 20 March 2015 …

In memory from his family    This returned letter from his cousin Chrissie Swayne was finally delivered to Sgt. Denison Brierley by June Hastings and Linda Goulbourne (daughters of Chrissie) on 20 March 2015.

His headstone alongside members of his flight crew

The Sword of Remembrance  on the Cross of Sacrifice

 
The entrance to the Reichswald Forest cemetery with Linda, June & Ian

I had never seen their like before. A little group of lead soldiers in varying states of distress. One was standing — a WW1 rifleman wearing a gas mask. I’m not sure how old he is, but might date from the 60’s.

Another lying machine gunner could be the same age — though he harks back to the machine gun corps of the First World War.

The remaining two seem much older. They are probably Britains models, but there is no identification on their base.  They have been repainted at some time — are these the right colours?

More investigation required …

WW1 Machine gun Corps — maybe 1960’s model

This soldier is old. Look at the helmet

WW1 machine gunner — ? BEF

Peaked hat and notice the moulded edges — looks really old

Infantry soldier, WW1 wearing gas mask