South Harrow
Note: This map only shows my rough estimation of where this airfield might have been situated within the UK. If anybody can kindly advise a more exact location, this will be most welcome.
SOUTH HARROW: Military aerodrome
Military user: RFC (Royal Flying Corps)
Period of operation: 1915 only?
NOTES: The first mention I found that this aerodrome existed was when on 10/3/15 2nd Lieut. Humphrey Minton Goode gained his Pilot Certificate No.1120 here flying a Maurice Farman biplane. Typically a fair amount of confusion seems to surround exactly where this aerodrome was. Some Pilot Certificate records state simply HARROW but presumably this is the same location? All these records were made in the first half of 1915 when in July RUISLIP is first mentioned. RUISLIP is of course near to SOUTH HARROW so did they just rename SOUTH HARROW or did they establish another aerodrome nearby?
Colin Richards
This comment was written on: 2020-08-16 11:43:52It was probably a confusion with RFC Ruislip, later RAF Northolt. In 1912, Claude Grahame-White who helped to found the nearby aerodrome at Hendon, proposed that the National Aviation Company Ltd., build Harrow Aerodrome. Despite some interest, this proposal fell by the wayside. The site was near the present Northolt Airport, but was north east of South Ruislip Station (then called Northolt Junction) on the Central Line. There is an apocryphal story that the civil servant, sent to requisition the land for RFC Ruislip, turned right out of the station instead of left and acquired the wrong site. I have a (not very clear) copy of the original Harrow Aerodrome map. To add to the confusion, Northolt Airport is in the former borough of Ruislip and Northwood, now part of Hillingdon. Northolt is and was then in the borough of Ealing. The War Dept named their RAF stations after the nearest railway station, presumably to help servicemen find their way there. Unfortunately, by the 1930s there were three Northolt Stations: Northolt Junction (in Ruislip), Northolt Halt (now Northolt on the Central Line in Ealing) and Northolt Park (on the border of Ealing & Harrow), on the line from Marylebone!
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