128117 Flight Lieutenant Joseph George Trull.
Navigator
The Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve.
228 Squadron.

Aged 27.
Son of Gunner Joseph Charles Trull, Royal Garrison Artillery (killed in action in France, 9th April, 1918), and Bessie née Dowsell Trull, of Uley. They were married in the quarter ended December 1914.
His birth was registered in Dursley district, in the quarter ended June 1917.



Joseph Trull was involved in two fatal crashes of Sunderland "Flying Boats" during World War 2.
He survived the first, but died in the second.

A "Flying Boat" Short S.25 Sunderland Mark 111, DW 110, was based at RAF Castle Archdale, Irvinestown, Co. Fermanagh. The base was on Lough Erne in Co. Fermanagh, and flew out to the Atlantic over the Irish Republic, via the "Donegal Corridor". They provided protection to North Atlantic Convoys, and hunted German Submarines that tried to attack the convoys. They were equipped with an early form of radar, which was used to find submarines on the surface at night, when they were charging their batteries.
The aircraft had taken off from RAF Pembroke Dock, and patrolled an area of the North Atlantic. It was scheduled to land at RAF Castle Archdale. This "one-way" trip would enable it to travel a further distance westwards.
It crashed into the Bluestack Mountains, Co. Donegal, during the night of 31 January 1944. Of the 12 crew members onboard, 7 were killed and 5 survived.

The Crew comprised

Howard Charles Sheffield Armstrong
Captain
Maurice Vincent Wareing
1st Pilot
Maurice Leonard Gillingham
2nd Pilot

Frederick Tom Copp
Flight Engineer.

Cyril Robinson Greenwood
Wireless Operator / Air Gunner.
John Ernest Parsons
Wireless Operator / Air Gunner.

Frederick George Green
Air Gunner

The survivors included
Flying Officer Joseph George Trull [He died later]
Navigator.
Warrant Officer John Bruce Richardson
Flight Engineer.
Flight Sergeant "Jim" Arthur Gowens
Wireless Operator / Air Gunner. [d. 1976].
Sergeant Charles Stanley Hobbs
Flight Mechanic (Engines) / Air Gunner.
Sergeant "Jim" James Kenneth Gilchrist
Air Gunner [d. 2008].



A Short S.25. Sunderland Mark III, ML 782, crashed during a night landing at a base near Devon. It was involved in an attempted salvage of another plane off Plymouth.
Joseph Trull, and
Harold Holmes
died in this crash.
Holmes's body was not recovered

Ernest John Dalton
died later in the salvage attempt, when a depth charge exploded.