Can anyone help please?

Discussion in 'The War In The Air' started by Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart, Aug 24, 2022.

  1. Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart

    Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart Senior Member

    I've just finished reading 'No Moon Tonight' and 'Journey's into Night' by Don Charlwood. While doing so I came across and interesting article on the interweb, about the pubs used by the RAF Elsham Wolds crews in Brigg, I cannot now find said article! I recall one being 'The Black Bull', another 'The Dying Gladiator' (christened 'The Dying Navigator' by the Raff boys!).
    Can anyone point me in the right direction to maybe find out about, places of WW2 interest in both Brigg and nearby Barnetby? I'm visiting the area in September and will be bungng my findings, along with piccys, on this fine site.

    :salut:
     
  2. CL1

    CL1 116th LAA and 92nd (Loyals) LAA,Royal Artillery

    Jamie for WW2 sites have a look here shows some still around example here Heritage Gateway - Results
    Will show old AA sites/Pill Box/decoy airfields etc

    Looks like the Dying Gladiator is still there under different guise as is the Black Bull


    regards
    Clive
     
  3. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    How long ago did you visit that website ?
    Have you looked back in your browsing history for it ?
     
  4. ltdan

    ltdan Nietenzähler

  5. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    Another good active RAF association is the Elsham one which cover No 103 Squadron and its offshoot, No 576 Squadron.

    RAF EWA (elshamwolds.org.uk)

    There is a very good museum dedicated to RAF Elsham in the grounds of Anglia Water whose WTP and offices are situated adjacent to the 14 runway threshold of the 14//32 main runway. I have had no problems in the past of entering the grounds although I note that now formal access permission is required now.

    The airfield was in a good state until the Humber Bridge A15 split the airfield from the technical area. Over the years the development of the business park has seen the 14/32 main runway removed. At the 32 threshold, a myth was current in the 1980s that there was a number of Lancasters buried there. (the DE,I recall) ...nothing found when the runway and its surroundings was excavated and developed. .

    As regards pub crawling, every pub within access by car for those who had them, usually officers and those which could be accessed by foot, and others who had trips by liberty truck was an attraction for all airfields. Postwar these pubs indicated their past patronage by the RAF with mementos and photographs of aircraft and crews. Unfortunately many have been been lost over time. No double RAF Kirmington and RAF Elsham Wold would share the same pubs at Barnetby..The Oswald pub at Scunthorpe was also an attraction which continued after the war into the 1950s.It had a dance floor and with an abundance of girls. A drinking hole at Scunthorpe was found by the RAF to be a source of VD at RAF Blyton HCU and visits were banned..
     
    CL1 likes this.
  6. Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart

    Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart Senior Member

    Thanks everybody, much appreciated
     
  7. Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart

    Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart Senior Member

    RAF Elsham Wolds.

    Living in Cleethorpes, I'm ideally placed, to go exploring 'Bomber County'. I recently re-read Don Charlwood's 'No Moon Tonight' and 'Journeys into Night', both books describing his tour of ops from Elsham Wolds.
    The master plan is to walk from Barnetby station up the old road to Elsham village, then up to what bit remains of the old airfield today. First up was a look at the surviving hanger and Memorial on the industrial estate...

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    This little tale is not related in either book, but I've been told it by more than one old timer on the seafront! A Grimsby trawler was spotted in trouble of Spurn Point by a an Elsham Wolds Lanc. The crew alerted the search and rescue lads in Grimsby and they rescued the trawler's crew from their sinking ship. Two of the rescued crew were brothers, their mother living in a large house called 'The Rookery' in Mill Road, Cleethorpes. To show her appreciation the old lady made the house open to any Elsham Wolds aircrew having a night out in Cleethorpes. Don Charlwood mentions staying there on several occasions. His description of a cold, wet and foggy Cleethorpes as he made his way back to the train station rings very true to this day. Proving that our pokey little seaside resort was as 'orrible then, as it is now!

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    'The Rookery'

    :poppy:
     
  8. Quarterfinal

    Quarterfinal Well-Known Member

    Both the Black Bull and the Dying Gladiator are still on the go (gearing up for the Thursday market)
    upload_2022-8-25_8-42-54.jpeg
    although both promote a different genre of ‘sky sports’ for clientele! There are some modest displays in the nearby Heritage Centre in the onetime Angel. Pingly Farm POW camp has been redeveloped over the past decade. Nearby Hibaldstow airfield - where Margaret Horton did a circuit literally hanging on to a spitfire for dear life - is still used partly for skydiving.
     

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  9. Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart

    Jamie Holdbridge-Stuart Senior Member

    Lancasters at RAF East Kirkby...

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    ;)
     

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