Casualty of WWII,John was a Sergeant/Flight Engineer[Service No:1567605] in the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve-102 Sqdn.
He was 21 and the son of William McMath Bremner and Ada Bremner of Fenham, Newcastle-on-Tyne.
He was previously commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial [missing air force casualties of WWII]but his remains were recovered in 2008.
He was buried with full military honours 64 years after his plane was shot down after his remains were tracked down by a comrade who survived the crash.His remains were found by the plane's navigator, Pilot Officer Reg Wilson.
John was one of eight crew of a Halifax bomber which came down near Berlin during a night raid on the city in 1944.
Four men died but the bodies of Mr Bremner, then 21, and Canadian Warrant Officer Charles Dupueis were never found.
The plane's wreckage, scattered across dense woodland, lay undiscovered for six decades.
Reg Wilson, having retired in 1984, returned to Germany in 2005 to meet historians and eyewitnesses who could point him to the crash site. He later took a team of metal detectors into the remote woodland and found the rusted wreckage hidden in dense undergrowth, along with Sgt Bremner's skeletal remains. It took two years to DNA test the bones, but they were confirmed as Sgt Bremner from Elswick in Northumberland.Reg, from Chigwell, Essex, and fellow survivor, rear gunner Sergeant John Bushell,aged 84, a retired civil servant, from Oakley, Beds.,travelled to the War Cemetery for the ceremony.
Halifax bomber LW337 - nickname 'Old Flo' - was hit at 18,000ft above Berlin just after 8pm on January 20, 1944, during a raid involving 800 planes. It burst into flames, from wing tip to wing tip. Reg Wilson had opened the escape hatch and bailed out. John Bushell was about to bail out when the plane spiralled out of control and started to hurtle to earth. Miraculously he was thrown out, came-to in mid-air and managed to pull the rip-cord of his parachute.
The four survivors, part of 102 Squadron based at RAF Pocklington, near York, were taken to prisoner of war camps. Two bodies - pilot Sergeant Kenneth Stanbridge, from London, and wireless operator Pilot Officer Eric Church, from Windsor, Berks - were found but two remained unaccounted for, Mr Bremner's and Warrant Officer 2 Charles Dupueis of the Royal Canadian Air Force, which is still missing.
Mr Bremner's next of kin, sister Marjorie Acorn aged 89 from Newcastle,attended the burial together with Mr Wilson and Mr Bushell.
Flying Officer Laurie Underwood, aged 86, of Wetherby, West Yorks., could not attend due to ill-health and the fourth survivor, Flying Officer George Griffiths of Stoke Newington, North London,had died in 1998.
He was 21 and the son of William McMath Bremner and Ada Bremner of Fenham, Newcastle-on-Tyne.
He was previously commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial [missing air force casualties of WWII]but his remains were recovered in 2008.
He was buried with full military honours 64 years after his plane was shot down after his remains were tracked down by a comrade who survived the crash.His remains were found by the plane's navigator, Pilot Officer Reg Wilson.
John was one of eight crew of a Halifax bomber which came down near Berlin during a night raid on the city in 1944.
Four men died but the bodies of Mr Bremner, then 21, and Canadian Warrant Officer Charles Dupueis were never found.
The plane's wreckage, scattered across dense woodland, lay undiscovered for six decades.
Reg Wilson, having retired in 1984, returned to Germany in 2005 to meet historians and eyewitnesses who could point him to the crash site. He later took a team of metal detectors into the remote woodland and found the rusted wreckage hidden in dense undergrowth, along with Sgt Bremner's skeletal remains. It took two years to DNA test the bones, but they were confirmed as Sgt Bremner from Elswick in Northumberland.Reg, from Chigwell, Essex, and fellow survivor, rear gunner Sergeant John Bushell,aged 84, a retired civil servant, from Oakley, Beds.,travelled to the War Cemetery for the ceremony.
Halifax bomber LW337 - nickname 'Old Flo' - was hit at 18,000ft above Berlin just after 8pm on January 20, 1944, during a raid involving 800 planes. It burst into flames, from wing tip to wing tip. Reg Wilson had opened the escape hatch and bailed out. John Bushell was about to bail out when the plane spiralled out of control and started to hurtle to earth. Miraculously he was thrown out, came-to in mid-air and managed to pull the rip-cord of his parachute.
The four survivors, part of 102 Squadron based at RAF Pocklington, near York, were taken to prisoner of war camps. Two bodies - pilot Sergeant Kenneth Stanbridge, from London, and wireless operator Pilot Officer Eric Church, from Windsor, Berks - were found but two remained unaccounted for, Mr Bremner's and Warrant Officer 2 Charles Dupueis of the Royal Canadian Air Force, which is still missing.
Mr Bremner's next of kin, sister Marjorie Acorn aged 89 from Newcastle,attended the burial together with Mr Wilson and Mr Bushell.
Flying Officer Laurie Underwood, aged 86, of Wetherby, West Yorks., could not attend due to ill-health and the fourth survivor, Flying Officer George Griffiths of Stoke Newington, North London,had died in 1998.
Casualty of WWII,John was a Sergeant/Flight Engineer[Service No:1567605] in the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve-102 Sqdn.
He was 21 and the son of William McMath Bremner and Ada Bremner of Fenham, Newcastle-on-Tyne.
He was previously commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial [missing air force casualties of WWII]but his remains were recovered in 2008.
He was buried with full military honours 64 years after his plane was shot down after his remains were tracked down by a comrade who survived the crash.His remains were found by the plane's navigator, Pilot Officer Reg Wilson.
John was one of eight crew of a Halifax bomber which came down near Berlin during a night raid on the city in 1944.
Four men died but the bodies of Mr Bremner, then 21, and Canadian Warrant Officer Charles Dupueis were never found.
The plane's wreckage, scattered across dense woodland, lay undiscovered for six decades.
Reg Wilson, having retired in 1984, returned to Germany in 2005 to meet historians and eyewitnesses who could point him to the crash site. He later took a team of metal detectors into the remote woodland and found the rusted wreckage hidden in dense undergrowth, along with Sgt Bremner's skeletal remains. It took two years to DNA test the bones, but they were confirmed as Sgt Bremner from Elswick in Northumberland.Reg, from Chigwell, Essex, and fellow survivor, rear gunner Sergeant John Bushell,aged 84, a retired civil servant, from Oakley, Beds.,travelled to the War Cemetery for the ceremony.
Halifax bomber LW337 - nickname 'Old Flo' - was hit at 18,000ft above Berlin just after 8pm on January 20, 1944, during a raid involving 800 planes. It burst into flames, from wing tip to wing tip. Reg Wilson had opened the escape hatch and bailed out. John Bushell was about to bail out when the plane spiralled out of control and started to hurtle to earth. Miraculously he was thrown out, came-to in mid-air and managed to pull the rip-cord of his parachute.
The four survivors, part of 102 Squadron based at RAF Pocklington, near York, were taken to prisoner of war camps. Two bodies - pilot Sergeant Kenneth Stanbridge, from London, and wireless operator Pilot Officer Eric Church, from Windsor, Berks - were found but two remained unaccounted for, Mr Bremner's and Warrant Officer 2 Charles Dupueis of the Royal Canadian Air Force, which is still missing.
Mr Bremner's next of kin, sister Marjorie Acorn aged 89 from Newcastle,attended the burial together with Mr Wilson and Mr Bushell.
Flying Officer Laurie Underwood, aged 86, of Wetherby, West Yorks., could not attend due to ill-health and the fourth survivor, Flying Officer George Griffiths of Stoke Newington, North London,had died in 1998.
He was 21 and the son of William McMath Bremner and Ada Bremner of Fenham, Newcastle-on-Tyne.
He was previously commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial [missing air force casualties of WWII]but his remains were recovered in 2008.
He was buried with full military honours 64 years after his plane was shot down after his remains were tracked down by a comrade who survived the crash.His remains were found by the plane's navigator, Pilot Officer Reg Wilson.
John was one of eight crew of a Halifax bomber which came down near Berlin during a night raid on the city in 1944.
Four men died but the bodies of Mr Bremner, then 21, and Canadian Warrant Officer Charles Dupueis were never found.
The plane's wreckage, scattered across dense woodland, lay undiscovered for six decades.
Reg Wilson, having retired in 1984, returned to Germany in 2005 to meet historians and eyewitnesses who could point him to the crash site. He later took a team of metal detectors into the remote woodland and found the rusted wreckage hidden in dense undergrowth, along with Sgt Bremner's skeletal remains. It took two years to DNA test the bones, but they were confirmed as Sgt Bremner from Elswick in Northumberland.Reg, from Chigwell, Essex, and fellow survivor, rear gunner Sergeant John Bushell,aged 84, a retired civil servant, from Oakley, Beds.,travelled to the War Cemetery for the ceremony.
Halifax bomber LW337 - nickname 'Old Flo' - was hit at 18,000ft above Berlin just after 8pm on January 20, 1944, during a raid involving 800 planes. It burst into flames, from wing tip to wing tip. Reg Wilson had opened the escape hatch and bailed out. John Bushell was about to bail out when the plane spiralled out of control and started to hurtle to earth. Miraculously he was thrown out, came-to in mid-air and managed to pull the rip-cord of his parachute.
The four survivors, part of 102 Squadron based at RAF Pocklington, near York, were taken to prisoner of war camps. Two bodies - pilot Sergeant Kenneth Stanbridge, from London, and wireless operator Pilot Officer Eric Church, from Windsor, Berks - were found but two remained unaccounted for, Mr Bremner's and Warrant Officer 2 Charles Dupueis of the Royal Canadian Air Force, which is still missing.
Mr Bremner's next of kin, sister Marjorie Acorn aged 89 from Newcastle,attended the burial together with Mr Wilson and Mr Bushell.
Flying Officer Laurie Underwood, aged 86, of Wetherby, West Yorks., could not attend due to ill-health and the fourth survivor, Flying Officer George Griffiths of Stoke Newington, North London,had died in 1998.
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