BOWEN, Chasten Leroy

Name: Chasten Leroy BOWEN

Born 12 July 1924

Birthplace: Compton, California

Age at arrival in Buchenwald: 20

Died 30 December 2016 in Longbeach, California, age 92

Service: USAAF

Service ID: 39569672

Service Rank: Staff Sergeant

Duties: Radioman and Flight engineer

Air Group: 8th Air Force, 91st Bomb Group, 323rd Squadron

Airbase: Bassingboum, Cambridgeshire UK

Aircraft: B-17G 42-97173

Date shot down: 8 July 1944

Fate of crew: 1 KIA, 2 captured immediately, 6 evaded; 5 of those captured destined for Buchenwald (Bowen, FORE, WARD, SCHARF, and ZEISER).

Evasion summary: Bowen and Zeiser were driven to Paris by Desoubrie and Orsini.

Date captured: 11 July 1944

Capture summary: Paris, with ZEISER.

Boxcar Transport: 15-20 August 1944, in boxcar #1 or #2

Buchenwald ID: 78336

Notes on Buchenwald internment:

Transferred from Buchenwald to: Stalag Luft III, South Compound

Kriege ID: 8163

Notes on SLIII internment:

Subsequent transfer to: Stalag VIIA, Moosburg, by train from Spremberg after forced winter march, 27-30 January, arriving 4 February 1945.

Notes on SVIIA internment: Work Camps 3324-46 Krumbachstrasse, Work Camp 3368, Munich

Liberation: 29 April 1945 by units from 14th Armoured Division of Patton’s Third Army.

Repatriation from ETO:

Discharged:

VA status:

Notes on Post-War period: Interviewed in the History Channel’s 2004 documentary Shot from the Sky about Buchenwald