How many things happen during our lifetime that stamp an impression on our minds that stay with us forever? The War Years in particular was a time when so much was going on that I'm sure older people who were around at that time have memories that they can recall as clearly as at the time they occurred.

One of the events that has stayed in my own mind is something that happened early on in the Second World War when I was at Whitehawk Junior school. On that day our teacher was leading the class up to the annex classrooms, which were always affectionately known as "The Huts", when we heard a loud noise like the whine of aircraft engines, causing all of us youngsters to turn and look in the direction from which the sound was coming.

Looking in a northwesterly direction from the school, we observed two aeroplanes spinning out of control and breaking up. A couple of the kids assumed that they were German planes that had been shot down and started to cheer but our teacher soon put a stop to that, telling us that it was nothing to cheer about even if they were German. On that day, Wednesday 30th April 1941, two British Beaufighter aircraft had collided somewhere over Lewes Road, above the old Allen West site.

It is thought that they were being test flown and it was claimed that they had been on the top secret list. When the authorities put out a statement that two Spitfires had crashed, it served to reinforce that rumour because even as a young child, I was interested in aircraft and would certainly have known the difference between a single engine Spitfire and a twin engine Beaufighter. Pieces of the planes were scattered over a wide area with one engine falling on allotments and another large piece of wreckage going through the roof of a house in Roedale Road.

To illustrate how the wreckage was spread over the area, P.C. Hinds who was at home in Edburton Road heard something falling in his garden and on investigation found debris from the crash. The Beaufighters each had a crew of two and one of the crews was unfortunately killed, the other successfully baled out and rescued. There were however other fatalities as well as the crew members who died... at the time of the incident, P.C. Laurence Holford who was on duty in the area and as was the practice, dropped in for a cup of tea in the little Watchman's Hut with the Watchman Stephen Dyer. Tragically, one of the engines of the stricken aeroplanes crashed through the roof of the little hut and both P.C. Holford and Mr. Dyer were killed. At the inquest sometime later the coroner, Mr. Charles Webb, recorded a finding of Accidental Death on both of the local victims of that tragic day's events.

Written by Fred Netley.