The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (424538) Pilot Officer Ian Ronald Osborne, No. 100 Squadron, Royal Air Force, Second World War.

The Last Post Ceremony is presented in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial each day. The ceremony commemorates more than 102,000 Australians who have given their lives in war and other operations and whose names are recorded on the Roll of Honour. At each ceremony the story behind one of the names on the Roll of Honour is told. Hosted by Chris Widenbar, the story for this day was on (424538) Pilot Officer Ian Ronald Osborne, No. 100 Squadron, Royal Air Force, Second World War.

424538 Pilot Officer Ian Ronald Osborne, No. 100 Squadron, Royal Air Force
KIA 3 February 1945
Story delivered 17 May 2018

Today we remember and pay tribute to Pilot Officer Ian Ronald Osborne.

Ian Osborne was born on 24 February 1924 in the Sydney suburb of Killen, to Ronald and Mabel Osborne.

A student prior to enlisting, Osborne volunteered for service in the Royal Australian Air Force in Sydney on 12 September 1942 and began training as a navigator before embarking for overseas service.

As part of the Empire Air Training Scheme, Osborne was one of almost 27,500 RAAF pilots, navigators, wireless operators, gunners, and engineers, who, throughout the course of the war, joined squadrons based in Britain.
After arriving in Britain, Osborne undertook further specialist training before being posted to No. 100 Squadron, Royal Air Force, in September.

As part of the RAFs Bomber Command, No. 100 Squadron was equipped with the four-engine Avro Lancaster heavy bomber.

On the night of 3–4 February 1945, Osborne was navigator in a Lancaster taking part in a bombing raid on the Prosper Benzol Works at Bottrop in the Ruhr industrial area of Germany. Killen and five of his fellow Australian crewmates – Flight Lieutenant Robin Ordell, Flight Sergeant Keith Kevin Reynolds, Flight Sergeant Raymond Kevin McKaskill, and Warrant Officer John Killen – and British crewmate, Sergeant Charles Scurr, were killed in action. The only member of the crew to survive was the British tailgunner, Flight Sergeant James Harper, who became a prisoner of war and spent the rest of the war in hospital recovering from his injuries.

The remains of the dead crew were buried in the St Elizabeth Cemetery in Venraij, in the Netherlands, but were later interred in the British and Commonwealth War Cemetery at Mierlo, in Noord-Brabant, in the Netherlands.

Ian Osborne was 20 years old.

His name is listed on the Roll of Honour on your right, among almost 40,000 Australians who died while serving in the Second World War.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Pilot Officer Ian Ronald Osborne, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Lachlan Grant
Historian, Military History Section