Former Dorset airfield's vital role during D-Day remembered

The role a former Dorset airfield played during the D-Day invasion of Normandy is to be remembered.

The commemoration marking the 80th anniversary D-Day and the part the Royal Air Force station at Tarrant Rushton played will honour pilots who took off from the airfield.

The commemoration venue is the former airfield’s stone memorial at ‘Windy Corner’ on the road to Witchampton in the shadow of a black wartime aircraft hangar and will take place from 12.30pm on Saturday, June 1.

Former Tarrant Rushton memorial with black hangar in the background (Image: Andrew Wright)Dorset airfields played a crucial role on D-Day as allied forces invaded occupied Europe in June, 1944.

At Tarrant Ruston three waves of Halifax bombers took off towing wooden gliders carrying soldiers bound for Normandy.

RAF Halifax & Horsa glider Tarrant Rushton airfield 1944 (Image: Andrew Wright)

The first British troops to land in Normandy in the first few minutes of D-Day flew in six Horsa gliders from Tarrant Rushton late on Monday, 5 June, 1944, to seize a vital bridge, near Caen.

The bridge was later named ‘Pegasus Bridge’ in honour of the Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry troops who took the vital landmark which allowed allied troops to push forward from the beaches.

The memorial is being organised by Friends of Tarrant Rushton Airfield Memorial.

Chair of the group, Anne Gardner, said: “Royal Air Force, Glider Pilot Regiment and Army veterans, former Flight Refuelling airfield staff, their families, friends and anyone with an affinity with the former airfield – and its remarkable history across almost 40 years – are invited to attend and bring chairs."

Anne, whose late father served in the Glider Pilot regiment in 1944, added: “Tarrant Rushton airfield has a remarkable and important history in times of both war and peace.

Tarrant Rushton RAF Halifaxes and gliders on D-Day in 1944 (Image: Andrew Wright)

"The courage of its Halifax aircrews, glider pilots and airborne troops should be remembered and commemorated.

"The bravery and sacrifice of the men who failed to return after flying from the airfield should never be forgotten."

The airfield was built in 1943 to train bomber and glider pilots for the D-Day, Arnhem and Rhine Crossing operations as well as the dropping of secret agents from the Special Operations Executive in occupied Europe, from southern France to the Low Countries and Norway.

Flying as low as 60 feet to avoid radar and German night fighters, Halifax crews from the airfield also took the Allies’ secret war of subversive supply, troops and arms dropping in darkness deep into occupied Europe and Scandinavia.

Bob Seymour at the Tarrant Rushton memorial with his father's picture and medals (Image: Andrew Wright)

Friends of Tarrant Rushton Airfield Memorial secretary Bob Seymour, whose father Robert was a Halifax navigator with No.298 Squadron and took part in D-Day, added: “Between April, 1944, and May, 1945, Tarrant Rushton’s No. 298 and No. 644 Squadrons flew 2,284 missions into occupied Europe, from southern France to Norway.

“Twenty-seven Halifax bombers were shot down and more than 160 aircrew lost their lives – British, Canadian, Australian, New Zealanders and men from other Commonwealth countries.

"Also killed were glider pilots, airborne troops and the Special Operations Executive secret agents dropped behind enemy lines.”

The site is now a huge windswept 300 acre field of waving corn under the shadow of Badbury Rings between Wimborne and Blandford.

To find out more, visit the Friends of Tarrant Rushton Airfield Memorial website at raftarrantrushton.org.