Sealand
SEALAND: Military aerodrome although possibly the first civil CHESTER aerodrome?
Also known as RAF SHOTWICK. To confuse matters further it seems the site was once divided, with two separate flying sites, being known as NORTH SHOTWICK and SOUTH SHOTWICK. To doubly confuse, SOUTH SHOTWICK was also once known as ‘DUTTONS FLYING GROUND’ and CHESTER AERODROME)
PICTURES: By the author in August 2016. Many of the hangars are still in use for various purposes.
Military users: WW1: Army & RFC (Training Squadron, Training School and Training Depot Station)
4TDS
51 TDS (Avro 504Ks, Caudron G.3s (?), SE.5As, Sopwith Camels)
51TS
55TS (Sopwith Camels)
67 TS (Avro 504Ks, Sopwith Camels & Pups)
27, 90, 95, 96, 98 & 103 Sqdns (Avro 504s & 504Ks, BE.2cs, Martynsides, Sopwith Dolphins, Pups & Camels)
Note: This picture from a postcard was kindly sent by Mike Charlton who has an amazing collection. See, www.aviationpostcard.co.uk
Looking at the aircraft that can be seen I would guess this picture was taken in the mid to late 1930s. However, advice on this will be most welcome.
AFTER WW1
1920 to 1939: 4 TSch/ 4 TDS
5 FTS [Flying Training School] (Avro Tutors, Bristol Bulldogs and Armstrong-Whitworth Atlas')
HQ 13 Training Group
HQ 10 TW (Airco DH.9s, Airspeed Oxfords, Armstrong Whitworth Siskins IIIAs & Atlas, Avro 504Ks & 504Ns plus Tutors, Bristol F2Bs, DH Gypsy Moth & DH Moth, Hawker Audax’, Harts & Hinds, Miles Masters, Sopwith Snipes)
A MICHAEL T HOLDER GALLERY
Note: The newspaper article was published in the Flintshire County Herald on the 27th May 1938.
Note: This fifth picture shows the North Side site, later to be renamed SEALAND. The eighth picture was obtained from Google Earth ©
WW2: RAF Maintenance Command 43 Group
47 MU
Post 1945: RAF 631 Volunteer Gliding School
It would appear that the USAF had a presence here, quitting in 1957
Location: W of A550, 5nm WNW of Chester
Period of operation: 1918 till present day? (Some say from 1917 which seems more likely?)
Runways: WW2: These are described at being divided between the ‘north’ site and ‘south’ site at the end of 1944.
WW2 North Site: 13/31 1161x46 hard (sand & tar laid in late 1942)
NE/SW 1189 grass E/W 914 grass
South Site: N/S 1216 grass E/W 942 grass
NOTES: This site also incorporates an area known as the ‘BEECHES’ owned by the Dutton family, and birthplace of Thomas Murthwaite Dutton, who is reputed, having become an aircraft engineer and aircraft builder, to have been the founder of RAF SEALAND.
In 2010 I discovered British Built Aircraft Vol.5 by Ron Smith and in this book he illustrates an advertisement, (he says published in 1917), which I will try to provide a very rough facsimile of below:
DUTTON AIRCRAFTS.
(T. M. DUTTON, A.M.I.E.E., Engineer)
School of Flying at Chester Aerodrome, Sealand, Chester.
IDEAL FLYING GROUND EXTENDING OVER 150 ACRES
IMMEDIATE VACANCIES.
All Particilars of Terms, etc, from Sub-Office, 52, Bridge Street, Chester
The ‘Sandycroft’ dispersal area was used, it seems by both RNAS and RFC aircraft, when landing and taking off from the small Landing Ground adjacent to the Dutton engineering works - see QUEENSFERRY
THE PRICE PAID
Quoting from Wings Across the Border by Derrick Pratt and Mike Grant the result of 51 TDS being formed was, “...immediate as 51 TDS Camels and SE5a’s started to fall out of the sky, at least seventeen over the next six months with eight pilots killed”. This sort of attrition rate in training in all sectors, including OTUs (Operational Training Units), seems to have been perfectly acceptable to RAF ‘top brass’ until well into the 1950s at least!
Being utterly cynical it seems to me that the “top brass” must have issued orders during this extended period stating that as many pilots as possible should be killed. But failed to stipulate that these should be enemy pilots!
Without this essential proviso it seems the ‘lower ranks’ set about their task with glee and gusto egged on by their instructors and senior officers. The safety record of the RAF throughout most of their history during training at all levels is an utter disgrace and should surely now be regarded as a national scandal.
A QUERY
On the 14th January 1919 Chester City Council approached the Air Ministry with intent to reclaim their ‘aerodrome’. This does of course seem pretty good evidence that SEALAND, or part of it, was once the ‘official’ Chester aerodrome prior to WW1. They didn’t get it back, it was to remain a military airfield from then on.
A SORRY TALE
By todays standards the competence level of the No.5 (S)FTS airmen (at least) seems to be so low that surely only idiots were employed to fly? They stalled when landing and taking off, overshot and undershot the runways, hit boundary trees, fences, houses and telephone wires and poles. They sometimes ‘spun-in’ at low level and often hit other aircraft when landing or taxying. They collided in the circuit, collided when landing from opposite directions and even collided with hangars! It is very easy to conclude that these people weren’t pilots at all - they were imbeciles bereft of any intelligence let alone flying skills. So would I have been, I suspect, if taught to fly by the RAF in those days.
A COMPARISON
In the years leading up to WW2 for example the almost total incompetence of many RAF airmen compared to professional civilian pilots, aircrews and support staff at all levels almost beggers belief. The RAF pilots and aircrews especially can hardly be blamed, I strongly suspect, as they were well down the ‘pecking order’ of authority within the RAF system. Engineers, technicians and ground crew barely featured in this very snobbish hierarchy. It has now been revealed that the opinions of pilots and aircrew in the RAF were not only disregarded - there were virtually no channels available to them to express their ideas. Orders were given and had to be obeyed.
This said, there is no doubt whatsoever, that many of those pilots that did survive the training regime in the 1930s, went on to be highly skilled and competent pilots. And, it is largely due to their expertise that the RAF performed so well in the so-called 'Battle of Britain'. Sadly, and tragically, as several of these pilots have since testified, many if not most of the replacement pilots fed to the front line squadrons had a very short life expectency due to their lack of suitable training, and indeed, quite a large number were killed on their first combat sortie.
EXAMPLES OF FLYING EXCELLENCE
At another level the ‘propaganda orientated’ Empire Air Days of the mid to late 1930s certainly deserve a mention and SEALAND certainly took part in this. In May 1939 it is said that over one million people attended these displays at 62 RAF aerodromes and 15 civil aerodromes. The 1938 programme here giving some idea of what was involved with the main display scheduled for 2pm to 7pm.
Prior to this and in the morning echelons of nine training Squadron aircraft flew over Chester, the Wirral, Wrexham and north-east Wales intent on whipping up interest. By mid-day or soon after all roads leading to SEALAND were blocked and very many people never made it to the airfield. Special trains with extra carriages offering ‘special offer low fares’ were laid on. Over 17,000 people got in, many to witness at the ‘Static Display’ the very latest Armstrong-Whitworth Whitley, Bristol Blenheim and the Vickers Wellesley!
The best of British design it has to said was quite frankly woefully inadequate to wage any meaningful aerial warfare at that time. Then again, if the German Dorniers, Heinkels and Junkers bombers during the 'Battle of Britain', (in daylight that is), hadn’t had fighter escorts - how well would they have fared?
This said it seems in no doubt the programme was impressive to onlookers with fifty aircraft on the ground, the ‘New Types Park’, ‘Circuits and bumps’, Landings and take-offs in ‘Vics’, (Three aircraft in ‘V’ formation), individual aerobatics, synchronised aerobatics by pairs of Hawker Harts, towing and release of target drones attacked by aircraft using front and rear mounted Lewis guns, picking up messages with a hook. Plus Squadron formation flying, (nine aircraft), a mini air raid with three bombers versus AA guns and a final mass flypast.
In addition there were numerous ground attractions from parachute packing to a machine-gun firing through a propeller! It was obviously many years before the Health & Safety mainly nerdulant pillocks had evolved to become a questionable strata within human evolution. In 1937 some fifty three RAF Stations hosted Empire Air Day displays. However, it wasn't without casualties, and across the nation thirteen fatalities resulted - so what does this say about the overall proficiency of RAF pilots?
SOME STATISTICS
In 1942 the station strength at SEALAND exceeded 4,000 with 400 billeted out. The WAAF contingent of 774 aircrasftswomen at 30 MU alone were accommodated on a ‘hutted domestic site’ at Wepre Hall. Against this information it appears that after WW1 the Station ‘only’ had 8000 officers and men on site. By 1935 this had risen to 22,000 it seems and 23,315 in 1936, and, a further 10,500 were anticipated in 1937 - making a total of nearly 34,000! Has somebody misplaced a decimal point?
AN ODDITY
WW2 produced many very odd aircraft designs but perhaps the most unusual was the Hillson F.H.40 Mk.1. In essence this was a Hawker Hurricane L1884 fitted with an extra wing, (making it into a bi-plane) to aid both taking-off with extra weight, and/or a shortened take-off run which would be ejected once airborne. Trials took place here, the first flight being on the 26th May 1943. It was not a success. Probably they didn’t appreciate that this could only be achieved with a much more powerful engine being added etc, etc? And I wonder, how did the 'top' wing behave when let loose?
AN EXAMPLE OF A VERY EFFECIENT OPERATION?
I think it is well worth mentioning something about 47 MU and the Ministry men who organised their affairs during WW2. For example, it is reported that brand new Hurricanes could be flown into SEALAND in the morning from the factory, (there were several of course spotted around the UK), and be partially dismantled, crated and ready for transport to Birkenhead docks by mid-afternoon. It appears that, with the outer wing sections removed, these aircraft ‘fuselages’ were then towed on their own undercarriage to the docks, perhaps for shipment to Africa or Russia for example.
Having been in the business of moving aircraft for many years I cannot think of a more stupid method of transporting aircraft than this one. The possibilities of inflicting major damage are nigh on endless. However, I didn't move aircraft in a war of course, (and containers hadn’t been invented), and possibly the massive amount of wood needed for packing crates simply wasn’t available.
It certainly seems to be a great testimony to the considerable skill and patience of those lorry drivers that, (as far as I know), delivered most if not all of these aircraft arrived at the docks undamaged. And of course, there was very little private traffic on the roads. Plus, in those days, professional drivers had a quite sophisticated system of signals, such as flashing their headlights, once ot twice, or keeping them on to indicate they were committed to 'comimg through'.
ENDNOTE
In the early years of the 21st century SEALAND was still listed as a RAF/ATC (?) gliding site and 631 VGS used the WW1 ‘South Camp’ Landing Ground area. Are they still doing so?
Peter Venour
This comment was written on: 2017-09-01 06:49:38I was an air cadet with 2184 Sqdn. in Heswall and learned to fly a glider at RAF Sealand (after glider training moved there from RAF Hooton) in about 1947. We also had flights in Avro Ansons from Sealand. During the war, we could look down from the cliffs at Thurstaston onto the Miles Magister trainers from Sealand, which fly very low. After the war I would go to Sealand airfield to watch the motorcyle speed trials along the runway.
Reply from Dick Flute:
Hi Peter, Many thanks indeed for these valuable memories - much appreciated. Best regards, Dick
David King
This comment was written on: 2018-01-15 23:26:51The USA's 254th Aero Service Squadron was also based there in 1918.
Paul Francis
This comment was written on: 2020-08-08 13:46:02My dad, Donald Francis was in 5 FTS at RAF Sealand in 1937 Please contact me if you remember him. Regards Paul Francis
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