You will find all sorts of things out there to stare at from slit trenches and Nissen huts, to runway fragments and control towers, some beautifully renovated like Rackheath, some falling down like Shipdham. There’s even a few hangars knocking about, quite a few actually; some being reused as business premises; Technical areas where all the general mending things, refuelling things gubbins were make a good ready made site for an Industrial Estate and there are a quite a few of those out there. The edges of airfields often still have perimeter tracks and taxiways, some now metalled and used as roads, some returned to use as roads having been through several incarnations. You can also spot things like tank blocks, mortar spigots and pillboxes that relate to the sites. There are even a few bomb dumps, parking turns and rifle butts along with remnants of accommodation blocks, latrines, mess halls and medical centres often hiding in woodland or repurposed in farmland, all are worth looking at and recording.
It is also worth noting that although these are listed as ‘RAF dot dot dot’, most of them in fact ended up being USAAF bases from 1942/43 onwards, nearly all of them hosting the 8th Air Force, I will eventually update all the entries to include both.
Above: Remnants of Second World War hardstanding on the roadside at a Tibenham airfield near the Norfolk Suffolk border.
Above: a standing building at RAF Thorpe Abbotts which became USAAF designation Station 139, home to the 100th Bombardment Group (Heavy) or The Bloody Hundredth. The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) arrived on 9th June 1943, from Kearney AAF Nebraska. The 100th was assigned to the 13th Combat Bombardment Wing, and the group tail code was a “Square-D”. Its operational squadrons were 349th Bombardment Squadron (XR), 350th Bombardment Squadron (LN), 351st Bombardment Squadron (EP), 418th Bombardment Squadron (LD)
Top: Feature image: 466TH BOMB GROUP, 786th Sq, Dougherty Crew # 612. While waiting for a delayed mission, crew members were taking it easy when a jeep rolled up and a photographer took this picture. American Air Museum.
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Really enjoyed all your airfield related reports.Thanks for sharing.
Looks like you are missing RAF North Pickering….
And Great Massingham
North Pickenham is on there (North Pickering is in Yorkshire), Massingham was indeed missing. Thank You.
My dad was a B-24 pilot based at #143 North Pickenham in 1944-45.
My dad was with 80 signals wing working on the beam blocking at RAF North Creake and RAF Oakington, Norfolk
Good piece of work here. People like you need a well done applause. In 2 weeks, 28th August 2017. I am travelling from Greenock in Scotland to Walsingham Norfolk. I shall do my usual trek along Langholm and North Creak, usually enter by the lane at “Blunts Corner”.
Little Snoring is scenic, but cannot get access to the control tower, due to it being an active airfield, but the perimeter track is fine.
A few years back, I done Thorpe abbots and Seething. Control towers are worth a visit, but I suspect you and many others have been.
Keep up the good work. Lee
Should Elloigh Airfield near Beccles be on the map ?
Hi Marie, I guess it could be, but it’s in Suffolk (just)
Looking for somewhere to take my daughter driving and bumped into your map, fersfield might be worth a go. Am sure there used to be RAF East Harling or Harling Road near me?
Hello,
I’ve just been reading that Mann Egerton had 60 acres of land on the Cromer Rd in Hellesdon complete with its own airfield and turned out thousands of planes for the war. Anyone have a map of the location?
Was it nor Roudham, WWI ? Roudham Lane-of fond memory 1950s!
Memorial I think on corner opposite Aspect Roofing.
Hi Tom, these are Second World War airfields. Same applies to Mousehold which was an RFC base and places like RNAS Bacton etc.
Unsure but weren`t they flown from Mousehold Heath ?
A hardly known airfield was at Snare Hill (A1088 where the light field borders the green filed below) today a chicken farm. It was a decoy for Honnington in WW2 and a major trading base in WW1. Buildings from both periods still exist but permission is needed to visit
I am building a 1/72 scale diorama incorporating an air base in Norfolk.
In have in mind a mess building for the crew. Metcalfe models have a Nissan hut but also a more attractive building, a cricket pavilion. Do you know whether a wooden structure like a cricket pavilion might have been seen on an air base in WWII? Would it have been a Nissan hut? Thanks. Keep safe and well.
It’s not unlikely. Certainly some Great War buildings were repurposed in some places. Check out Great War Huts online, that might give you some ideas.
You have my respect. Did a Battle of Britain diorama on a huge sheet of fibre board in 1968 for a school project. Spitfires, Hurricanes, tower, 22″ long hanger, the whole bang lot. The runways were smoothed Polyfilla and the grass stippled Polyfilla; I was having doubts about my sanity! Won 10 shilling gift voucher! If you complete your diorama, let us know, I’d love to see it.
I was posted to Feltwell Easter 1959 as my “permanent” posting under National Service as a Teleprinter Operator. TP,s were the forerunners of computers and the internet. Great station. Very cold in winter – the cold winds came off the North Sea. This was the time of the Thor missiles and was over run with American forces ( some are still there) who were so better paid than RAF boys. I remained there until demob in October 1960 but still have good memories of that period.station ceased as an RAF station with the abandonment of Thor and is now still a dormitory base for the “Yanks!
Reading this with all the trouble in the Ukraine I am reminded that as a 10 year old living in Cratfield Sfk I stood and and watched as the bomb dump exploded at Metfiled it is with me still . Also my uncle had Sneath Farm farm at Great Moulton and while visiting I watched bombers returning from a raid all shot up going into a holding pattern over Tibenham , crashing into one another, the poor bastards jumping and the parachutes not opening.
My aunt worked on the air base and danced with James Stewart !
I write this from the safety of Adelaide- when will they ever learn