Norma Raley

Photographs and information are sourced from the 416th Bomb Group Archive with great help from Wayne Sayles. Additional information is taken from her obituary.

Norma Maxine Raley was born in Harrisburg, Saline County, Illinois on 27^th December 1922. One school friend remembered how, when they graduated from school in Vienna Illinois in 1939, she was too young to be accepted for nursing school. However, the friend continued, ‘never fear – she found a way’. Nursing was a skill that came naturally to her as another friend would later describe her as ‘one of the finest nurses I have ever known’.

^{Norma Raley’s identity card (416th.com)}

Norma joined the US Army Nurse Corp as a lieutenant on 1^st June 1943 aged 19. Her identity card describes her as 5ft 1in with blue eyes and blonde hair. She joined the 298^th General Hospital which had been based at Frenchay Park since 11^th November 1942.

^{Norma at the edge of female accommodation huts – location unknown} ^(416th.com)

In Frenchay, she would have worked alongside doctors, surgeons and nurses of the US Army as well as local nurses trained by the Red Cross. At the time, the casualties primarily came in to Avonmouth Docks from the North African and Italian campaigns that were raging. On average, the soldiers had been wounded 6-8 weeks before they arrived so these patients required considerable attention.

^{Norma Raley at Brockley Transit Camp shortly before leaving for Normandy} ^(416th.com)

While working at Frenchay Hospital, she attended a dance for the nurses where she met Wayne E Downing, a pilot in the USAAF, 3 years her senior. He was serving with 2911^th Bomber Squadron flying reconnaissance missions over northern France while based at Keevil Airfield near Trowbridge.

^{Wayne E Downing outside RAF Keevil, Wiltshire, 1943} ^(416th.com)

In their free time together, Norma and Wayne were able to visit the Blitzed-damaged areas of Bristol such as St James’ Park in Haymarket.

^{Outside St James Presbyterian Church, Horsefair, Bristol} ^(416th.com)

^{Wayne Downing and Norma Raley on the war memorial, St James’ Park, Haymarket, Bristol} ^(416th.com)

The 298^th General Hospital were stood down on 10th May 1944 and Frenchay Hospital was taken over by 100^th General Hospital. After further training and waiting at Brockley Combe Transit Camp (near Bristol Airport), Norma and her fellow nurses landed on Utah Beach on 16th July 1944. The 298^th General Hospital took over the Cherbourg Naval Hospital following its recent liberation and within two weeks they were receiving patients.

^{The nurses of 298th General Hospital at Frenchay} ^(416th.com)

Within the next two months, Norma and Wayne wrote to their respective commanding officers asking for permission to marry. Permission was duly granted and they were married in a civil ceremony on 20^th October 1944 in Cherbourg by the city’s mayor with an interpreter present. The same day, their vows were repeated in a French Chateau in a military ceremony conducted by an army chaplain.

^{The wedding of Wayne and Norma Downing in Cherbourg, France, October 1944} ^(416th.com)

In the winter of 1944/45, the 298th received casualties from the Battle of the Bulge before the unit were themselves moved near to Liege, Belgium. Here they stayed until the end of the war when they returned home and the 298^th General Hospital was inactivated on 5^th October 1945.

^{Local newspaper article about Norma’s work (416th.com)}

In the meantime, Wayne Downing had been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross ‘for heroism and extraordinary achievement while piloting an A-20 aircraft. Lieutenant Downing’s many sorties into enemy territory have led him against the enemy’s fiercest opposition. He has always demonstrated the highest standards of the service in combating overwhelming odds.’

After the war, Wayne continued his stellar flying career so he and Norma moved around wherever his service took them. They retired to Thousand Oaks, California and, after 66 years of happy marriage, Norma died on 31^st December 2010. Wayne died peacefully, aged 98 in 2018.

^{Norma Downing in later life} ^(416th.com)

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