From the Missing Air Crew Report, eye witness account:

"One ME 262 presumed to have made attack at our flight and to have shot down Lt Alison, who was flying #4 in the flight. Other Group Reports that a P51 on fire was seen to go down."

Lt Alison, was initially buried at the community cemetery of Legden. When his remains were digged up, they made a mistake, and since 1945 his remains are missing.

The following story appeared in the Anniston Star (Anniston, Alabama) on 8 August 1999:

They never knew who he was. All they knew is that they were in trouble. Their bomber had lost an angine and they were now flying alone, way below the rest of their formation, a fat juicy morsel for any German fighter that came along.

Then an American P-51 appeared off their wing tip, a guardian angel to see them safely home.

They just started to relax a bit when the German fighter did appear. It hurtled down from somewhere above and behind them, faster than anything they had ever seen before. It blasted the P-51 out of the sky, then rolled toward Earth and disappeared.

If that P-51 had not been there to take the attack...

And they never knew who he was.

Four months ago, Everett Jones saw a model airplane magazine on the newsstand. The shape on the cover caught his eye.

Sleek and bat-winged, it was the same shape he and his crew had glimpsed in that electric moment over Gemany 55 years ago - an Me 163 Komet, the rocket-powered German fighter. But Jones was not thinking about the German plane. He was thinking about the fate of the American pilot.

"I had never really forgotten." Jones says. "But when I saw that magazine with that cover on it, that really lit my fuse. I thought there just has to be a way to trace that, to find out who that P-51 pilot was."

A few days later Jones places an ad in Air Force Magazine: "Seeking information on a P-51 pilot shot down in the Gelsenkirchen, Germany area Nov. 1, 1944".

The first letters arrived within weeks. A thick sheaf of correspondence and documents began to accumulate. Nobody had the whole story, but each had a piece of the puzzle.

Jones knew the American fighter pilot who sacrificed his life that day was a hero but he didn't know who he was. The others knew who he was but they didn't know he was a hero. It took all of them to put the story together.

"You'dd had to know my brother," says Tom Alison. Tom is a retired mortgage banker in St. Clair, Michigan.

On Nov. 1, 1944, he was in the US Navy. His older brother, Denis Alison - called "Spike" - was a 2nd Lieutenant, flying a P-51 with the 20th Fighter Group out of England.

"My brother's P-51 was the only one downed on that date, according to records," Tom says. "That's why James Herbert contacted me."

As it turned out, there was a mistake. Wrong day, wrong plane. But Tom and a member of the Dutch group, Henk Jensen, started writing to each other regulary. Later on, that would com in Handy. In the meantime James Herbert suggested Tom to join the 20th Fighter Group Association, a veteran's organization that includes relatives of deceased pilots.

This opened new evenues of information, because Capt. James Herbert remembered Lt. Denis Alison well.

On Nov 1, 1944, the 20th Fighter Group was escorting B-17s over Germany. There were three squadrons, each with four or five flights.

That day Capt. Herbert recalls there were Germand jet fighters about. Me 262s that were considerably faster than the P-51s and wery dangerous.

Calling for his flight to follow, Capt. Herbert dropped nose of his Mustang and gave chase. For a time, it appeared the jet had outrun them. Then he turned. "My number three man and another cut a circle inside us and shot his engine out at 16,000 feet."

Engagement ended, Capt Herbert called for his flight to form up. "And Alison never showed up." he says. "I just assumed that jet had gotten Alison."

So it appeared on the official MACR. For 55 years, it was assumed that Lt. Denis Alison had been lagging behind his flight and had fallen prey to a German Me 262 jet fighter.

Steve Blake, a post mail carrier and amateur aviation historian in California, spends his leisure time researching air-to-air combat during WWII.

Everett Jones' ad caught his interest. Several years ago, he and another historian had looked into an incident involving a P-51 on that date for a book they were writing.

He dug into the files and found copies of the reports and photos of the pilot and mailed them to Jones.

The pieces seemd to fit. Only one P-51 had been shot down that November day: 2n Lt. Denis Alison had been the pilot.

The burgemeister of Wiefer-Lieftucht had reported to German authorities the burned wreckage of an American P-51 outside the village of Legden.

Lt. Alison's body had been identified from his dog tags.

With German thoroughness, the local police chief noted the contents of the pilot's pockets: eight coins. The body was buried the following day in the town cemetery.

Now, Everett Jones had a name and photos to work with. He sent a leter to the Birminghan Chamber of Commerce asking for help: "I am on a dedicated challenge to locate the nest of kin for a deceased 2nd Lt. Denis J. Alison," he wrote. "I have some information which I believe woudl be of interest to anyone in the immediate family of Lt. Alison.

Jones also mailed an account of the P-51 incident to Steve Blake.

"There is an unwritten law," he says, "you did not leave your formation." B-24's bristled with defenive armament and there was safety in numbers. NOw, 4,000 feet below the rest pfo the pack, they were alone.

For 30 minutes they flew on, ayes anxiously scanning the sky.

"The P-51 just suddenly appeared up off our right wing," Jones syas. Nobody knew where he had come from. Their own escorts, P-47 fighters, were apparently busy elsewhere.

Then he was gone.

-- https://www.fieldsofhonor-database.com/index.php/en/american-war-cemetery-margraten-a/44889-alison-denis-j

Denis J Alison