STOURTON and GASPER HISTORY

I remember when they made the Zeals Airfield up there, these flipping great machines up there and pushing all these hedges out. You know, in about a week it was all levelled off… Tom Chapel

They came and went. Sometimes (Zeals Airfield) was all covered in Bostons, they were American Bombers but RAF owned. Then they moved out and Mosquitoes moved in. Then in came Dakotas with their Gliders. And then Americans turned up with P47s, Thunderbolts, big fighters… David Andrews

When they built the aerodrome here it was a very wet year, when it rains every day. That’s why, although you’ve got a (concrete) perimeter, you’ve got no runways and so it was an advanced fighter station – originally built for the R.A.F., then the Americans had it and then the Navy … Jim Gatehouse

(Zeals Airfield) It wasn’t active in the Winter because it used to get waterlogged and they’d all clear off when it started getting too wet and come back in the Spring… David Andrews

Crashed Corsaire

H Company

We had our own eggs and we used to do a cockerel for Christmas. Luckily, when War (WW2) started, you see, we were at a great advantage because we still had the garden vegetables – which made a lot of difference … Valerie Evil

You used to get some good dogfights over here in the daytime. There were all these Spitfires and Hurricanes diving all over us. This man what lives in a house, he said “You silly so-and-sos, get off these bikes and get down in the ditch before they start firing on you.” I don’t think we took any notice of him. We didn’t have much sense then, did we… Tom Chapel

At School during WW2 we always seemed to be quite proud we thought we’d seen a spy. Crazy it was really but that’s what we used to think…May Fricker