Dear Blogger
The Village Home Front - RAF REDNAL
It seems the war hardly impinged on the people of Ruyton but by 1942 it was very different for Rednal, one of the Eleven Towns near West Felton.
In 1939 there were around 100 airfields, some just grass runways, in Britain and by 1945 a further 1,000 had been built. An uncle of mine was told he had a weak heart so they sent him off to mix and lay concrete to build runways. There were even men who were told they could not join the forces as they were more valuable as a builder.
As the Luftwaffe had no idea where Shropshire was, or even that it was on the way to Merseyside, RAF Rednal was a good place to train young pilots. When you are 18, 19, 20 years old nothing can possibly happen to you - apparently the lads at Rednal would `play` dog fights with American trainee fighter pilots from RAF Atcham!
There are two stories which are not included in the Village Home Front panels attached.
Roger Hampson of Haughton Farm on the edge of Rednal airfield, was just 3 years old when he wandered out into the farmyard, and his father was on the other side of the yard, when 20 year old Stanley Lister crashed into the barn. Amazingly, neither Roger or his father were hurt, unlike the young pilot who died at the scene.
Once RAF Rednal was up and running, with accommodation for WAF (Women`s Air Force) girls on site, the railway company made regular stops at Rednal railway station. One night, a group of girls who had been `out on the town` returned and had walk across the railway line to get home. Numbers have been lost in time but there was a group of young women and some lost their lives when hit by an oncoming train. The accident let to a footbridge being erected at Rednal.
