Son of James and Louise Anderson. He attended S.S. #10 Usborne from 1920 to 1925 and Exeter High School from 1925 to 1930. He subsequently attended the University of Western Ontario from 1930 to 1932 and then taught at the Thames Road School and Chemins in Northern Ontario before joining Kerr-Addison Gold Mines Ltd of Rouyn.

Pilot Officer Anderson enrolled in the Royal Canadian Air Force at North Bay on 28 October 1940. He took his basic training at No. 1 Manning Depot Toronto and RCAF Station Trenton.
On 28 January 1941 he attended No.1 Initial Training School at Toronto and then No. 3 Elementary Flying Training School at London. He took advanced flying training at No.1 Service Flying Training School at Camp Borden, graduating 31 July 1941 and being commissioned as a pilot officer in recognition of his flying abilities.
On 14 August 1941, he was posted to England and after taking instruction in the Vickers Wellington III bomber at No. 23 Operational Training Unit, was posted to 419 Squadron 1 January 1942.

Operation Fuller


In February 1942, two of Germany's few remaining battleships were blockaded in Brest, France. From the German viewpoint, the ships were not safe from enemy attack, and were of no use as long as they were cooped up in a French harbour.
It was therefore decided that the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau would break out of Brest and race down the channel to the German naval base at Kiel. The British were aware of this, though, were taken completely by surprise and were unable to deploy heavy naval forces in time to block the eastern end of the English Channel.

The RAF Bomber Command was given the task to stop the break out.
Wellington Z1091 squadron ID VR-A took off at 1700 as part of Operation Fuller, Bomber Command was to bomb and mine the Brest seaport area. All this was in response to the German Operation Cerberus. Cerberus was an attempt to counter an expected British invasion of Norway.

The German Navy's most mighty ships were to break out of the Brest area to prevent the invasion at the order of Adolph Hitler. The order given was to either send the ships out or have them scraped. Hitler was no longer a supporter of a surface navy. The Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and the Prinz Eugen individually were dangerous, together they were a force to be reckoned with.
Both he Royal Navy and Bomber Command put a into place a large number of aircraft and ships that were set aside for this operation.
The German Navy would be supported by two hundred Luftwaffe fighters to provide air cover for the ships.
419 squadron was to loose two aircraft on this night. Z1094 with P/O Anderson as second pilot was one that did not return.
Pilot Officer Anderson is commemorated on the Runneymede Memorial and on a bronze plaque on the Cenotaph located in St. Marys, Ontario.