98 FLYPAST September 2018
AIRFIELDS CUMBRIA TO SCOTLAND
Emerging from the undergrowth, Silloth’s
water tower dominates the skyline.With the Solway Firth alongside,
Silloth was also ideal for training
Coastal Command crews. The
oddly named Landplane Pool was
established in November 1939
with ubiquitous Avro Ansons and
later, large numbers of Lockheed
Hudsons. This outfit was more
appropriately renamed 1 (Coastal)
Operational Training Unit (OTU) in
April 1940.
In the spring of 1943 Coastal
Command carried out a shuffle;
1 (C)OTU moved to Thornaby
in Yorkshire with 6 (C)OTU
coming the other way. The latter
specialised in another maritime
workhorse, the Vickers Wellington,
and these were a common sight
until July 1945.
Kirkbride, the home of 12 MU
from June 1939 and functioning
to mid-1960, was also a dual-role
station during World War Two. With
so many types arriving in the area
for acceptance prior to service,
storage, or eventually, breaking up,
it became a regional base for the
Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) – the
civilian-staffed service that ferried
aircraft from factories to MUs
or other units.
The ATA’s 16 Ferry Pilots Pool was
established at Kirkbride in 1941. It
operated a sundry fleet of Ansons,
DH Dominies and Fairchild Arguses
to ensure its pilots could be in the
right place at the right time.
As well as storage and workshops,
Kirkbride is still used by a thriving
General Aviation community with
runways aligned on the wartime
east-west and northeast-southwest
layout. The original watch office
survives, presiding over the
comings and goings.HMS ‘Nuthatch’
Across Moricambe Bay from
Silloth is Anthorn, a former
FAA airfield with its southern
perimeter running along the
water’s edge. The coastal location
and tall aerial ‘farm’ of the military
communications relay outpost
make Anthorn difficult to miss.Completed in September
1944 as Royal Naval Air Station
HMS Nuthatch, and akin to its
RAF neighbours to the south,
Anthorn was used for pre-service
preparation, modification and
storage of a wide range of FAA
types, ranging from GrummanHellcats in 1945 to Fairey Gannets
in 1957.
Anthorn was downgraded to
care and maintenance status in- It was not idle for long; its
remoteness made it the perfect
location for a long-range radio
communications facility, and it
Blackburn Firebrand TF.5s of 813 Squadron
were based at Anthorn in 1948. KECA Stanton air raid shelter, stripped of its
protective earth banks, on Kirkbride’s
northern site.