Tomorrow we start filming our documentary "In The Footsteps of
Bud Owens". Please consider making a donation to this great project
(contact budowens381@gmail.com or via Paypal).
Your gift WILL make a difference. Not the least for the Owens family
who will be able to add a final chapter to the story of their beloved
uncle who gave his all during WWII.
Above are three generations of that family- Bud's brother Jim Owens, Colleen Brennan, Bud's niece, and Hayley Hulbert, Bud's great-niece. Colleen will be accompanying Hayley on this pilgrimage.
Here are a few words from Colleen:
"My father, Jim, was one of 10 Owens children, 8 years younger than Bud.
Little was known about the events following the crash of Bud’s B-17 on its return from a bombing mission to Le Mans on 4 July 1943. The Owens family was notified by the War Department that Bud was MIA. An older brother, Joe, also served in the war and spent some time after the war trying to discover anything about Bud. He met with resistant Andre Rougeyron who told Joe of the events with Bud from 4 July 1943 with the French Resistance in Normandy & Paris. After "handing-off" Bud to other resistors in Paris, Mr. Rougeyron's commitment was to other downed airmen in the Normandy area and had no idea of Bud's fate.
In January 1946, the family received a letter from the American Red Cross Home Service Department with an attached letter from Andre Rougeyron dated 22 November 1945. Mr. Rugeyron wrote that he was "very grieved" to learn of Bud's death. He "appreciated his qualities and good humour, his pluck and presence of mind; he was a swell, indeed and I mourn his death like that of a dear relative."
I've asked my father why did Uncle Bud do what he did---risk his own life on more than one occasion : during a bomb-loading accident in England, ensuring that the his semi-conscious radio operator was strapped into his parachute and released from the crippled B-17, assist another ailing escapee on the trek thru the Pyrenees at the cost of his own chance of freedom. Those standards instilled in Bud, in my father, in all of the Owens' by my grandparents and recognized in Bud by Mr. Rougeyron, are something I strive to emulate daily."
Above are three generations of that family- Bud's brother Jim Owens, Colleen Brennan, Bud's niece, and Hayley Hulbert, Bud's great-niece. Colleen will be accompanying Hayley on this pilgrimage.
Here are a few words from Colleen:
"My father, Jim, was one of 10 Owens children, 8 years younger than Bud.
Little was known about the events following the crash of Bud’s B-17 on its return from a bombing mission to Le Mans on 4 July 1943. The Owens family was notified by the War Department that Bud was MIA. An older brother, Joe, also served in the war and spent some time after the war trying to discover anything about Bud. He met with resistant Andre Rougeyron who told Joe of the events with Bud from 4 July 1943 with the French Resistance in Normandy & Paris. After "handing-off" Bud to other resistors in Paris, Mr. Rougeyron's commitment was to other downed airmen in the Normandy area and had no idea of Bud's fate.
In January 1946, the family received a letter from the American Red Cross Home Service Department with an attached letter from Andre Rougeyron dated 22 November 1945. Mr. Rugeyron wrote that he was "very grieved" to learn of Bud's death. He "appreciated his qualities and good humour, his pluck and presence of mind; he was a swell, indeed and I mourn his death like that of a dear relative."
I've asked my father why did Uncle Bud do what he did---risk his own life on more than one occasion : during a bomb-loading accident in England, ensuring that the his semi-conscious radio operator was strapped into his parachute and released from the crippled B-17, assist another ailing escapee on the trek thru the Pyrenees at the cost of his own chance of freedom. Those standards instilled in Bud, in my father, in all of the Owens' by my grandparents and recognized in Bud by Mr. Rougeyron, are something I strive to emulate daily."
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