RAF Warmwell was part of No 10 Group. The airfield closed immediately after the war and much of it disappeared through sand and gravel extraction.
Part of Holy Trinity Church is over 700 years old, but considerable alteration has taken place, including in Victorian times.
Pilot Officer Harold John Akroyd, born in Oxfordshire, worked for Middlesex County Council before the war and was a member of the RAFVR. He seems to have had outstanding flying ability.
Early in the war, as a Sergeant, he joined No 152 Squadron at Acklington, where he was known as “John”. In July 1940 the squadron moved to Warmwell.
On 7 October the squadron was scrambled, with Pilot Officer Akroyd flying as Blue 3, to meet a large formation of Junkers Ju88s, with fighter escort. In the ensuing engagement Akroyd’s Spitfire was hit, perhaps by fire from a Messerschmitt Bf110, and caught fire. He crash-landed at Shatcombe Farm, near the hamlet of Wynford Eagle, and was admitted to hospital in Dorchester with severe burns.
John Akroyd died the next day with his wife Irene at his bedside.
Sergeant Alan Norman Feary came from Derby and was brought up by his widowed mother. He was employed in the Borough Treasurer’s department and learned to fly with the RAFVR.
Feary became an ace flying Spitfires with No 609 Squadron. On 7 October his aircraft was hit over Weymouth during a surprise attack by Messershcmitt Bf109s. He eventually baled out but was too low for his parachute to open properly.
Squadron Leader Michael Robinson wrote to Alan Feary’s mother: “His reputation as a brave and fearless fighter pilot was handed over to me by his previous commanding officer and I can say that he died as he would have wished – for his country. It would be difficult to tell you how much he will be missed by his fellow pilots.”
Sergeant Jaroslav Hlavac was born in Czechoslovakia and served in the air force. After the arrival of the Germans he reached France and joined the Foreign Legion and then the French Air Force. He escaped the Germans again and came to England, where he became a member of the RAFVR and spent time with three fighter squadrons.
On 10 October, he was lost on his first operational patrol with No 56 Squadron, being shot down in an engagement with Messerschmitt Bf109s over Wareham, Dorset. His Hurricane crashed on Manor Farm, at the hamlet of Worgret.
Flight Lieutenant John Connelly Kennedy, “John” to his family but “Jack” at school and in the RAF, was born in Sydney. He joined the Royal Australian Air Force in 1936 and transferred to the RAF in 1937.
In the Battle of Britain he was a flight commander with No 238 Squadron. On 13 July Jack Kennedy crashed near Weymouth after attacking a German bomber during a convoy protection sortie.
Squadron Leader Terence Gunion Lovell-Gregg was born in Wanganui, New Zealand. He joined the RAF in 1930. Early in the Battle of Britain he became CO of No 87 Squadron at Exeter.
At about 17.30 on 15 August, 87 was scrambled to meet an incoming German force. The available Hurricanes took off, led by the CO.
Pilot Officer Roland Beamont was one of the pilots following “Shuvvel” Lovell-Gregg. He was quoted by the author Norman Gelb as saying that there were eight aircraft from 87 and recalling a radio message that 100 Germans were coming in over Cherbourg. Then the controller said that it was 120 plus, then it was 150 plus south of Portland heading north. Next the sky was “full of those black bees – a great mass of them.” They were stepped up, with Stukas at the front and stretched back across the Channel. Clearly the Portland naval base was the target.
Beamont heard Lovell-Gregg over the radio say: “Come on chaps let’s surround them.”
In the ensuing attack Lovell-Gregg’s Hurricane was hit and caught fire. Witnesses described the Hurricane circling in the vicinity of the village of Abbotsbury. Then it skimmed across a wood and a ploughed field and crashed into a copse. A farmer’s son found the pilot lying dead at the scene. His body had bullet wounds.
Flight Lieutenant Ian Gleed became acting CO and represented the squadron at Lovell-Gregg’s funeral. In his book, Arise to Conquer, Gleed wrote that “the world seemed too beautiful for a funeral”.
Sergeant Sidney Richard Ernest Wakeling was born in London. He joined the RAFVR in the spring of 1939 and arrived at No 87 Squadron in early July 1940.
August 25 was a day of major German attacks on targets in Dorset. Over Portland at about 6pm the still very inexperienced “Stump” Wakeling was shot down. Pilot Officer Beamont saw a burning Hurricane falling past him. It hit the ground on a hillside at New Barn, Bradford Peverell near Dorchester.
Six men to whom, in the words of a poem by their comrade, Christopher Foxley-Norris, “you owe the most of what you have and love today”.
Geoff Simpson. FRHistS
