Fred Sutherland (RCAF airman)

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Frederick Edwin Sutherland (26 February 1923 – 21 January 2019) was a Canadian airman in the Royal Canadian Air Force who became one of the original members of No. 617 Squadron RAF. He took part in Operation Chastise (the famous Ruhr Dams raid) and later in Operation Garlic, and he was one of the last survivors of these raids when he died.

Sutherland was born in Peace River, Alberta, the son of a doctor and a nurse. As a boy he dreamed of becoming a bush pilot. He joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in July 1941 and trained as an air gunner in Britain. He served with No. 50 Squadron at RAF Waddington, flying 25 operations over targets such as Hamburg, Essen, Stuttgart and Turin.

In March 1943, Les Knight formed No. 617 Squadron, and Sutherland joined his crew. The team took part in Operation Chastise on the night of 16/17 May 1943. Although decorated others, Sutherland did not receive a separate award for the raid.

His final mission with 617 Squadron was Operation Garlic on the night of 15/16 September 1943. After their aircraft was damaged, Knight tried to land and ordered his crew to bail out. Sutherland, who had already started to bail out, landed in a field near Zwolle and linked up with his navigator, Sidney Hobday. With the help of the Dutch Resistance, he used false papers and a secret escape route, the Chemin de la Liberté, to reach Spain and then Gibraltar. He returned to the United Kingdom on 6 December 1943. Because of his escape, he was not allowed to fly over occupied Europe again and finished his air service in Canada at the end of 1943. He then worked as a gunnery instructor.

On 4 January 1944 he married Margaret Baker, and they had three children. Sutherland earned a forestry degree from the University of British Columbia in 1957 and worked for the Alberta Forest Service, living in several cities before settling in Rocky Mountain House in 1964, where he became Superintendent of the Rocky Clearwater Forest and retired in 1986.

He died at the Rocky Mountain House General Hospital on 21 January 2019 at age 95. His wife had died two years earlier, in 2017, and his funeral was held on 29 January. After his death, George “Johnny” Johnson became the last surviving member of Operation Chastise.