Your cousin was shot down on January 5th, 1944. My uncle was the navigator on a B-17 and was shot down on January 11th, one of three survivors from the crew of ten. He also spent over a year in a POW camp.
One can barely imagine what it would be like to be in a POW camp through D-Day and on to the end of the war in Europe. I regret never having had much chance to know my uncle.
Your uncle’s war experience sounds so similar to that of Ray’s. Ray was one of 2 survivors from a crew of 9 (maybe 10). Perhaps they were at the same camp. Here are a couple of links to a website that lists data about Stalag 17, including known POW names at that camp.
http://stalag17b.com/Docs/Stalag17bcom_US_POW_list_2015_02_21_Watermarked.pdf
http://stalag17b.com/files.html