Now here's an odd tale that's been bugging me for about thirty years. I used to know a chap who used to fly Lysanders during the war. He related to me that was flying happily along one day, miles from any known aerodromes, when he saw a Proctor below flying very low. He was then surprised to see it land and, thinking the Proctor pilot had made a forced landing he turned to have a look. Much to his surprise, the Proctor quickly taxied straight into a building and was hidden from view. Even more surprisingly, a team of men then proceeded to scurry about the field replacing a section of field hedge with some sort of mobile camouflage, so that in seconds, there was nothing whatever to see...
Since this was wartime, it wasn't prudent to ask to many questions about this sort of thing of course, so he kept his silence at the time. He said that he'd always wondered what this was all about. All I know is that at the time, he was based at Shobdon (Towing Hotspurs to train glider pilots.) and the incident was in the Hereford/Leominster area.
At that time, as it happens, there were a lot of Proctors based at Madeley, training Radio Operators. A possible connection..?
Was this just an exercise for some sort of continental adventure - or some secret facility....? It's obviously 100% Kosher, as I got it directly from the witness.
The question for the forum then is;- Is there any known precedent for this kind of activity.....any other similar reports....? Over to you...!
This may be one of the many grass airstrips that were commissioned outside the responsibility of the Air Ministry.
I suspect that this observation had taken place post 1943 after a part of the RAF Thame Training School had been reassigned to Shobdon.
The following is my recollection of an unsubstantiated discussion heard in the early 1970's.
During the first 12 months of the conflict a number of grass landing strips were identified to train special operation pilots in the delivery and collection of personal and materials both behind enemy lines and close to front line operations.
There had been a number of different defensive lines that were considered to be defensible in the event of a successful landing during 1940/41.
The last defensive line heading west from London had been along the Welsh Marshes and Severn Wye River channels.
The belief had been that the German Army would not want to fight a major close quarter battle in the Welsh Hills and would have preferred to hold their advance at this line until the defenders would have been starved of materials by simple blockade.
These simple grass airstrips were only known to the few special operations pilots who were responsible for working with the local marquis.
I've never seen any thing to support this explanation however it could be one possible reason for the observation.
Many thanks for those interesting replies. It was obviously something that they wanted to keep secret - or at least were practicing for that. I'd love to know if these sort of sites were ever listed/documented in any way....?
Knowing the military's penchant for documenting things, I wonder if there was a handbook/manual/protocols for setting-up and operating such landing grounds....? Have any images of this type of operation survived..?
What is an SLG by the way....? (Secret Landing Ground..?)
Many thanks for those interesting replies. It was obviously something that they wanted to keep secret - or at least were practicing for that. I'd love to know if these sort of sites were ever listed/documented in any way....?
Knowing the military's penchant for documenting things, I wonder if there was a handbook/manual/protocols for setting-up and operating such landing grounds....? Have any images of this type of operation survived..?
What is an SLG by the way....? (Secret Landing Ground..?)
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