Originally Posted by
Tankertrashnav
Whilst that is certainly true in the case of a Dambuster crew member, it is not always the case.
I once went to look at a Mosquito logbook which was being offered for sale by the deceased original owner's family. I had high hopes of some very interesting reading but I discovered that the chap had spent his whole time in Coastal Command, and his ops were recorded as page after page of "Patrol, area X," or whatever. The flying was dangerous and an essential part of the anti submarine campaign, but the unpalatable truth was that it made uninteresting reading. In the event I decided not to make an offer, and suggested that they kept it in the family for posterity.
Hope this chap gets his just deserts. Maybe an offer of a reduced sentence if he produces the logbook might be effective in bringing it to light.
Yes you're absolutely correct, the phrase 'can be very valuable' would have been more appropriate in this case. I collect WW2 RAF/Luftwaffe logbooks and the really 'good/valuable' ones to me are mainly those where the author has recorded some of the finer detail of their missions....more often than not Luftwaffe rather than RAF. Many Luftwaffe aircrew also had exhaustive details of their missions recorded in a matching 'Leistungsbuch', which has been copied across into some of my Luftwaffe logbooks, aka Flugbuch.
Sorry to go OT, back OT the guy is still a **** and hopefully will get s deserving custodial sentence.