Allrighty...here we go
First stop was at Dunkeswell
RAF...later USN... Dunkeswell was originally planned as a Fighter Command, then Coastal Command Airfield but was then transferred to the US forces and became Station 173 It was built to the standard RAF Wartime Class A design for heavy bombers by Wimpey and construction finished in June 43 at a a cost of £1.1M. Initially set for RAF 19 Group Coastal command, the first operations were flown when the 479th Anti-Submarine Group with their specialised Liberators arrived. The Seabees continued to do upgrades throughout the War.
A couple of anecdotes for you, it was nicknamed by the US "Mudville Heights" and the airfield was also used as a glider base for the raids to Germany. The passengers included Americans, including a brother or cousin of the Future President Kennedy who was reputed to have been killed when one of the gliders crashed on take off in to a small wood close to the runway !.
The Airfield is currently in use and has an active flying school a, great little museum, Memorial and a cafe on site. The Museum and Memorial are by the Flying School.
The original Control Tower is still in place but you can't get access to it,so we took a few pics from as close as we could get.
Here's a shot (not our pic) of the Base as it is at the moment
And here's a pic (not ours)of the Site from WW2
On the way to the airfield, I picked up an original engine mount from a PB4Y-1 Liberator that actually operated from the airfield !!!. Needless to say, I took the opportunity to take a few shots next to the Memorial
And here's a pic of the Memorial without a relic in front... Absolutely love the Sentiment !
Then it was walkaround the Museum. The Museum is housed in a couple of conjoined Portacabins and contains a whole heap of artifacts and details about the Airfield and its use during the War. Easily a good hour could be spent here looking at and taking everything in. Here's a few pics...not going to show all so you'll have to go and visit yourself !
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One of the Pics showed some crew back in WW2 using a local telephone box. Talking to the volunteers manning the museum, they told us that the telephone box was still in place and about a 1/4 mile form the Airfield entrance...so we had to go and have a looksee and take a modern shot...
There are still a few original building in place but you can't access them, ranging from re-clad Hangars and the obligatory Nissen /Quonset huts...would love to have been able to walkabout but there's no public access.
And lastly, a zoom pic of the Tower, with I think the original MT / Fire section building just behind.Not ideal but we couldn't get around the airfield to see it
. What we are planning on doing is contacting the Airfield owners to see if we can get a return visit planned just to see the Tower !.
I'll hand over now to Tony for his pics and update