|
WHEN TEMPSFORD AIRFIELD was being constructed the
buildings of Gibraltar Farm on the eastern side
of the site became isolated within the perimeter
track but they were not demolished. The farm barn
was later used as the holding point for SOE
agents immediately before they were taken to the
aircraft that were to transport them into Europe.
Here agents were also supplied with their
equipment - and poison pills in case of capture.
The building has been preserved and carries an
appropriate plaque acknowledging its historic
past.
The barn (reached by a footpath to the east of
the airfield) is on private property and
permission to visit should be sought.
Violette Szabo was twice dropped into France,
flying out on both her missions from RAF
Tempsford. Her last flight, when she was only 23
years of age, was on the evening of 6 June 1944
in a Liberator supplied from RAF
Harrington.
On 10 June she was ambushed near Limoges by the
S.S. Wounded and on her own, she fought off
elements of the 'Das Reich' division with her
machine gun until her ammunition ran out.
Following lengthy torture at the hands of the SS
she was taken to Ravensbruck concentration camp
where she was eventually shot on 25 January
1945.
Nancy Wake, an Australian who had married a
French businessman in 1939, was living in France
when the Germans invaded in 1940. She commenced a
risky involvement with the French resistance
movement until her activities were discovered by
the Germans. After escaping to England, she
joined the S.O.E. On 29 April 1944 she parachuted
into the Auvergne District of France in order
organise local French resistance before and after
D Day.
Photographs: The barn as it
is today (top). Gibraltar Farm in wartime (above
left). The barn is shown centre-left in the
picture. The recent Ordnance Survey map (right)
shows the airfield district. Note the marked row
of electricity pylons to be seen in the pictures
below. The barn is indicated below and to the
right of the lower end of the pointer. Everton
village with its church and public house is shown
at the bottom right of the picture. The Great
North Road (A1) runs parallel to the left edge of
the map, and the main LNER railway is to the
right of it.
|
TAKING OFF from Tempsford in a fully laden
Halifax bomber was not without risk in itself.
Half a mile to the East of the runway is Everton
Hill (from which the picture below was
taken).
As one observer has put it: "The trees on the
hill in line with the flight path were felled to
make take-off just possible. As you stand on the
end of the runway today, looking east, the bald
patch on the hill is still very obvious!" The
picture above is of a runway looking west towards
Tempsford. The power lines were erected after the
war!
Photograph: Part of a runway
as it is today, now used for 'drag-racing!
(above).
|
In 1963 the hangars and land were sold. Much of
airfield concrete was removed for hard core,
apart from strips used as farm access roads. All
the T2 hangars were removed but the solitary B1
still survives.
Photograph: The surviving B1
hangar near the Everton railway crossing.
(right)
|
THE FOLLOWING TEXT is taken from the 14th July
1945 edition of the newspaper 'The Evening
Standard': The author was James Stuart, then
living in Tempsford.
"Tempsford is just a hamlet in rural
Bedfordshire. Its inhabitants mostly work on the
land, and none of them knew it but Tempsford held
one of the big secrets of the war. They knew that
down a little side road marked 'This road is
closed to the Public' there was an R.A.F.
Station. In 'The Anchor' and 'The Wheatsheaf'
they saw the R.A.F. men but that was all. They
had no idea of the job that they were engaged
on.
"Names of the pilots and crews that did that job
cannot yet be revealed except for one, the late
Group-Captain Pickard, D.S.O. and two bars,
D.F.C., the famous 'Target for Tonight'* pilot.
When he left Bomber Command, Pickard commanded
one of the two 'Special Mission'
 Squadrons
which the R.A.F. created as a link with the
underground movement in all occupied countries.
From Tempsford they delivered arms, ammunition,
radio sets, food and other supplies to all
underground fighters from the Arctic Circle of
Northern Norway to the Mediterranean shores of
Southern France. From big bombers, Whitleys
first, and then Stirlings and Halifaxes, they
dropped their parachute containers.
"Every kind of supply went down from skis and
sleighs for the Norwegians to the bicycles and
bicycle tyres made in England (but carefully
camouflaged with French names) to the resisters
of Western Europe. For three years the airfield,
built over what had been a large area of marsh,
was the air centre of the resistance movement of
all Europe.
"Night after night the villagers saw airplanes go
off and probably heard them returning in the
small hours. But they never saw the people, men
and women in civilian clothes, who were driven
down the prohibited road from the airfield, the
men and women who had been brought to England
from Occupied France under the very noses of the
Wehrmacht and the Gestapo."
(*A wartime feature/documentary film made for the
Ministry of Information.)
Photographs: View from
Everton Hill overlooking the Tempsford Airfield
site (above left). Plaque near the barn at
Gibraltar Farm (above right).
|
|
To return to the Bedford and District Home Page
please click here
|
|
