Leonard Stanley Carpenter

Leonard “Johnny” Carpenter of Moncton was the, son of Urban “Ubie” Carpenter, the General Chairman of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, and Bessie (Crawford) Carpenter of 21 Enterprise Street. He was a star hockey player in Moncton on several junior teams and later was a forward with the Moncton Maroons. Later still, he played for the Moncton Eagles. 

A graduate of Moncton High School, he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in October of 1940 and trained right at home, graduating from Moncton’s No.8 Service Flying Training School in July of 1941. He went overseas shortly afterward and was not seen by his family again. 

He flew a Wellington for the first time in September of 1941 while stationed in England. He was transferred to Gibraltar and flew numerous operations over the North African desert. In April of 1942, on his sixth operation that month against Benghasi, engine trouble forced him to put his aircraft down in the desert and abandon it. Undeterred, he was back in the skies in another aircraft almost immediately, completing six more raids against Benghasi and Martuba in May. 

By July he was involved in flying operations against Tobruk and provided air support in the battle against Rommel’s tanks at El Alamein, fighting what many historians say marked the turning point of the war. 

Carpenter was eventually sent back to England where he served as an instructor. In the secrecy and generally poor communications of wartime, his family thought he was still stationed in Gibraltar when they got word he had been killed February 13, 1943. Ironically, he had survived the desert and Rommel only to be killed when the tail of his aircraft suddenly broke off while he was flying 150 feet above the English countryside. He is buried in Stratford-Upon-Avon.