Born in Rodney Ontario near the closing months of the Great War. Plyley joined the RCAF in the early stages of the new war in Montreal on July 4th 1941. A skilled sheet metal worker at Fairchild Aircraft he would have found a place and most likely a rank befitting his experience right off the start in the trade in ground crew. Although my reviewing Plyley's service records it shows a man who strongly felt that his best contribution to the RCAF was in a role in aircrew. He completed one Tour, and then returned for a second Tour within the highly trained and dangerous role of the Pathfinder squadrons.

Training


His Manning Depot training was at No.1 Depot in Toronto. It appears to have been cut short by an injury to his arm about two weeks after the training was started. He spent over a month in the Hospital then returned to complete his Manning Depot assignment. As with many men his "soldering" skills were used in ways that were not related to becoming an airman, in Plyley's case he was posted to No. 1 Equipment Depot in Toronto.
On January 18, 1942 he was taken on Strength at No. 4 B&G School at Fingal Ontario. One month later he would be in Halifax at No.1 "Y" Depot with rank of Acting/Sergeant, in preparation for overseas posting to the RAF trainees pool. After arriving it was not until June 6th. that he would involved in yet more gunnery training with No. 7 Air Gunnery School at Stormy Down, leaving No.7 as a full Sergeant.
Posted to No.22 OTU on July 7th of '42. After the crewing up and worked up into a ..... flying the Wellington, Sgt. Plyley and the crew were posted to 419 Squadron on September 22 1942 and flew as part of P/O Weedon's crew. Flying just two operations on the squadrons Wellingtons, the crew drops of the Squadron Log as they were readied for the Halifax. No indication on his Service Record of this training, which would seem to indicate the conversion process may have occurred at Middleton St. George?
Sgt. Plyley appears to have returned to operational duties after the rest of the crew, flew one operation with P/O McLaughlin before reuniting with F/O Weedon on February 26/27th. Plyley continued with Weedon until July 26th when he had to return to hospital for surgery on his arm. By the time he was released on September 20th, the rest of the Weedon crew had completed their Tour.
As F/S Plyley he completed two ops with F/S Doubassoff's crew. On November 17th Plyley was transferred to No. 1664 HCU as an Instructor.

Post 419 Squadron


After what may have been a short posting to the HCU, Plyley was involved in anti-aircraft duties at 639 Squadron until June 27th when he requested Special Leave and returned to Canada. His Leave was for only 30 days and by September he was back at No.3 PRC at Bournemouth, he had requested duties with a Medium bomber squadron on his Leave papers. His short stay with HCU and at 639 Squadron seem to indicate he wanted to make a a more active contribution then in the training units.
After a number of weeks he left No.3 PRC and was at the Path Finder Night Training Unit at Warboys. By October 19th he was starting his second Tour flying with W/C Kenneth Lawson DSO & Bar DFC. While flying with 405 Squadron on the night of Jan 2/rd. 1945 the Lancaster he was gunner on was attacked and brought down at Rohrau 3km ENE of Nufringen. Only Plyley and Sgt. Rhodes the Flight Engineer escaped from the aircraft, it was his 12th operation with Lawson. During the bail out or parachute landing WO Plyley received injuries to his left knee and ankle.
An emergency promotion was put in place and Plyley was commissioned as a Pilot Officer, retroactive from January 1st. As POW #7735 Plyley spend the remaining months of the war as a prisoner at Stalag Luft I at Barth near the Baltic Sea. Dangers were also present even as liberation seemed near. The Germans were to march the prisoners to another prison camp as the advancing Russian Army came towards the Stalag. The Senior PoW Officer persuaded the German Commandant to leave the prisoners and escape with his own troops before the Russians arrived.
To help keep from causing any injuries or deaths from the Russians, each prisoner wore a home made armband with his nationality spelled out in Russian. Fears that the Russians would delay the prisoners release and return to their own American or British camps by forcing them to travel to Odessa in Russia were over come when the Russians finally gave permission for the prisoners to be air lifted out of the area.
And so even after being liberated Sgt. Plyley was in a very uncomfortable situation. By May 15th all the British PoWs were back in England.
By June 1 1945, Dorland Plyley was back home in Rodney Ontario, he had applied for active service in Tiger Force his discharge papers show Pilot Officer Dorland Gillies Plyley Transferred to Reserve, General Section, Class E as of 22nd September 1945. With the war over in the Pacific and the bomber squadrons being disbanded he continued on in civilian life until his passing on 30th. of October 1969.

Crew of Lancaster PB477, LQ-B 405 Squadron were:
MU/G F/O Gerald Edward Greeves RCAF
Pilot W/C K.J. Lawson DSO and Bar (over 90 Sorties)
Navigator P/O Stan H Fitzhenery RAAF
B/A S/L Nathan Crawford DFC RCAF
WAG F/L Eric C Duke RAF
F/E Sgt. Sidney RAF

Our Thanks to Dorothy Mather for her very in depth research on P/O Plyley, and the crew of Lancaster PB477, in Honor of F/O Gerald E. Greeves, and sending the information to the site