Keith Dixon
On the 8th July 1942 Flt. Lt. AJP Fane was killed when his photo reconnaissance spitfire crashed beside the Trumpington to Haverhill railway line in Stapleford. Fane had set off from RAF Benson in Oxfordshire and flew to the baltic to photograph U Boat yards. On the return journey the weather was very bad and Fane was forced to land at RAF Coltishall in Norfolk. A couple of hours later he decided to fly back to Benson but the weather became even worse. At about 15.55 Fane was following the railway line south of Cambridge and with the cloud virtually down to the ground he appeared to try to locate Duxford which he would have known was close by. He lowered the landing gear ready to land in a field if Duxford didn’t appear. In making a slight turn his wing clipped a hedge next to the railway line cartwheeling the plane into the ground. Fane was thrown clear but was killed. T o enable photo reconnaissance spitfires to fly very long distances they carried no guns or armour and also had extra fuel tanks to fly long distances. The pilots chosen to fly PR spitfires not only had to be brilliant pilots but also had to be excellent navigators with the stamina to fly for hours on long missions. Many aircraft on these solitary missions were shot down by enemy fighters. Over 20 years ago I wrote a history of Stapleford in the 2nd World War had and conversations with Pat Rickett, who with his father, farmed the land on Bury Farm where the plane crashed and also Basil Beavis, Tony Prior and other men who were teenagers at the time. None ever mentioned a crashed spitfire. They knew all about the Wellington bomber that crashed on the Old Vicarage and the bomber that crashed into the trees at Wandlebury but nothing about a spitfire. When Anthony Hoskins wrote to the Parish Council last November asking if anyone had information about the spitfire crash, the message was passed to me as chairman of the History Society and I replied that I thought he was misinformed. However, he was able to email a map of the crash site supplied by the RAF and an aerial view which pinpointed the spot. Who could argue with that? Tony and I have been in regular correspondence during the last eight months and we finally met at the Granary on the Village Day in July. Tony displayed parts of a restored aircraft, a Merlin engine and details of his plans to erect a memorial in honour of the pilot. Fane was a famous racing driver before the war and one of his cars, a Frazer Nash, was also on display beside parts of the spitfire. Tony is very well known in the world of aviation history so it was no surprise when a spitfire made two circuits of the Granary at very low level during the afternoon. Tony Hoskins had hoped to be able to unveil a memorial on the 80th anniversary of FLt. Lt. Fane’s death but there were delays in getting permission from the land agents so it is now hoped to have it in place for Fane’s birthday on 11th November. Tony is planning a big celebration which will be well publicised. Anthony Hoskins has created a webpage with more information about Flt.Lt Fane, photo reconnaissance spitfires and the proposals for the memorial which are well underway. This can be found at. www.spitfireaa810.co.uk/fane