Training in England

Croix de Guerre · 17 March 2011, 05:13 AM

I am researching an American volunteer with the RFC/RAF who arrived from Canada to England in February, 1918. In his letters he states that he spent two weeks in London before reporting to duty sometime around Feb 18th. Where would this have been? By the end of Febraury he is in hospital at Tidworth for a few weeks but by mid-March he was back with his squadron. Does any one know of a list of RFC airfields or training bases in the UK?

Thanks for any help,
Tom

MattyBoy · 17 March 2011, 06:52 AM

Hi Tom,
There were a lot of training squadrons in the UK by this time. Does your man mention any colleagues or perhaps the C.O. of the squadron at this time?

Croix de Guerre · 17 March 2011, 07:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MattyBoy

Hi Tom,
There were a lot of training squadrons in the UK by this time. Does your man mention any colleagues or perhaps the C.O. of the squadron at this time?

Yes, he was with 92 Squadron until sent over to 74 as a replacement in May, 1918.

John McKenzie · 17 March 2011, 10:36 AM

Hello ...I am Not any sort of expert on RFC personnel , however , from local knowledge I "can" say that Tidworth is on Salisbury plain where there were several RFC bases ...

#8 & 12 Training Depot Station (TDS) was based at nearby Netheravon ...training for HP 0/400's .

Also ,formed Jan 1918 , # 1 , School of ( Aerial) Navigation & Bomb Dropping .( SNBD) based at nearby Stonehenge ...( formed from 2TDS and RNAS (HP's)from Manson .
Included at Stonehenge later was 2 SNBD .

Placed in the area are RFC stations at Larkhill and Upavon .

PS some smaller original , possibly workshop ? buildings still exist at Larkhill , which is now the home of the Royal Horse Artillery .( I have raced there myself , several times , many years ago , in Point-to point Steeplechases . )

For a more definative answer , try asking the question on the "Cross & Cockade " web site , where they seem to specialise mostly in personnel in particular , rather than here on this , more "Aircraft" orientated Forum.

Regards John M

MattyBoy · 17 March 2011, 10:45 AM

John Grech (a knowledable member of this forum) has a list of RFC/RAF squadron C.O.'s, although i'm not sure if any UK-based training squadrons are included on this. He can be contacted on here, or you can try to get in touch with him by visiting the following website which he has created:-

66 Squadron

Scorpiounbound · 17 March 2011, 11:40 AM

What ho chaps

John, (McKenzie) Larkhill was in the area it is true but it closed as an RFC aerodrome in late 1913 or early 1914 (depending on the source). There certainly is no shortage of possible sites in the Wiltshire area and realistically you could take in some of Hampshire because Tidworth was a garrison town and it might have been that the hospital was the chosen site for all (reasonably) local military illnesses/non-battle injuries at the time.
There is undoubtedly someone on this site who can give chapter and verse on squadron movements in the area.

Cheer ho

John

Graeme · 17 March 2011, 02:44 PM

Tom

As No 92 (Training) Squadron was based in Canada, I presume the reference is to No 92 (Fighter) which was was at Chattis Hill, Hampshire, until 16 March 1918, moving to Tangmere, West Sussex, the following day. The squadron moved to Bray Dunes (between Dunkirk and Nieuport) on 2 July 1918.

No 74 (Training) Squadron was, I believe, based in the Castle Bromwich area (a short way east of Birmingham)

No 74 (Fighter) Squadron was at London Colney, Hertfordshire, until 24 March 1918, moving to Goldhanger, Essex, the following day. It went to France at the end of the month under the command of "Grid" Caldwell. In May 1918 the squadron was at La Lovie, Belgium.

Graeme

Croix de Guerre · 17 March 2011, 06:33 PM

According to my research, my pilot enlisted in Toronto, Canada on September 5, 1917. On October 16, he sits for a panoramic photo with Cadet Course No. 15. By October 31st he was in Desoronto, Ontario and by mid-November he was training in Ft. Worth, Texas. A photo caption describes him as being with 82 Squadron (training) at this time. He spends Christmas at home and returns to Canada where he is commisioned. January 31st he is onboard the RMS Tunisian in a convoy to England. Febraury in London on leave for two weeks and then at Tidworth Officers Hospital for two weeks with a bout of "rheumatism". He is assigned to 92 Squadron by April 8, 1918. He writes that he hopes to go over to France with his O.C. He is at Gunnery School "near London" on May 10, 1918. Gets orders to report to the Air Ministry for reassignment to 74. In his own words;

London for me was a historical paradise. Here were so many contacts with the ages gone that I was fairly dizzy sorting the past from the present; I was often lost in medieval London, while the modern was clanging all around me.
Two weeks were soon ended, and I found myself in a wagon yard off Great Smith Street, being assigned to a station at Stockbridge, Hants. Here I threw my lot in with 92 Squadron of the R.F.C., and with them I expected eventually to go to France. This suited me fine as the C.O. was a New Zealander and most of the pilots were either Canadians, Americans in disguise, or other Colonials entirely lacking in swank.

Stockbridge was an ill starred place, for we got little time in the air and lots of foot slogging between the town, where we were billeted and the aerodrome. So, we were glad to get orders to go down to Sussex, not far from Chichester with it’s Roman wall, Norman church, ancient market cross and not to mention a respectable pub just across from the afore mentioned church and its separate bell tower.
Spring was coming up and Sussex, Sussex by the sea is a choice place when balmy breezes blow. Bicycling became a fad and we pedaled all over the country lanes, to Goodwood race course, to the Duke of Norfolk’s ancient seat at Arundel. Why we used our legs so violently when we saw all from the air, I do not know. All I got out of it I remember was lame joints and a bill for damaging the wheel.
From this station we were sent off to Marske, in Yorkshire, on the North Sea and came under the chill spell of that moody body of water. We were supposed to do aerial gunnery here, but before I had got off the ground orders came for me to report to the Air Ministry. An S.E. pilot in a squadron in France had “gone west”. Some one was needed to take his place. Fate, or some such fancy, put a hand into a hat full of fledglings and out came my name. So I went, bag and duffle, to the Hotel Cecil and there a Captain, the Honorable Whose-Name-I’ve-Forgotten, told me I was to go the next day to the 74th Squadron, Royal Air Force, in France; to report at Victoria Station at eight, and to please file my “next-of-kin” card before quitting his honorable presence.

My man arrives in France just in time to witness his first air raid on May 18. The next day he is driven out to Clairmarais to report to 74 where he meets a "nice young chap in shorts" who he soon discovers is his O.C. Major Keith Caldwell!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Graeme

Tom

As No 92 (Training) Squadron was based in Canada, I presume the reference is to No 92 (Fighter) which was was at Chattis Hill, Hampshire, until 16 March 1918, moving to Tangmere, West Sussex, the following day. The squadron moved to Bray Dunes (between Dunkirk and Nieuport) on 2 July 1918.

No 74 (Training) Squadron was, I believe, based in the Castle Bromwich area (a short way east of Birmingham)

No 74 (Fighter) Squadron was at London Colney, Hertfordshire, until 24 March 1918, moving to Goldhanger, Essex, the following day. It went to France at the end of the month under the command of "Grid" Caldwell. In May 1918 the squadron was at La Lovie, Belgium.

Graeme

Graeme · 18 March 2011, 12:51 AM

Tom

By 18 May 1918, No 74 Sqn had suffered half a dozen casualties:

Lieutenant Sydney Claude Hamilton BEGBIE, Pow 21-Apr-18, Dow 22-Apr-18, SE5a D281
Lieutenant Philip James STUART-SMITH, Kia 08-May-18, SE5a C1078
Lieutenant Ronald Ernest BRIGHT, Kia 08-May-18, SE5a B8373
Lieutenant Henry Eric DOLAN, Kia 12-May-18, SE5a B7733
Second Lieutenant Lambert Francis BARTON, Kia 17-May-18, SE5a C1854
Lieutenant Leigh Morphew NIXON, Kia 17-May-18, SE5a C6404

The squadron's locations were St Omer 30 March 1918, Teteghem 1 April, La Lovie 9 April, Clairmarais 3 October, Marcke 23 October and Cuerne 1 November.

Graeme

john_g · 18 March 2011, 01:39 AM

Tom

As I see it the question you are asking is that after two weeks in London he reported for duty and you ask where would this have been?

I far as I understand, he would have reported to the Hotel Cecil on arrival, been sent on leave and stayed in London at a London Hotel or Club or other lodgings, and then reported to the RFC at the Hotel Cecil for duty or instructions where to go after his leave. Most of the men who I have researched who arrived from Canada did just this.

John_g

66 Squadron