Arthur Clarke was born in Altrincham, Cheshire on Boxing Day 1919.
In January 1931, he and his sister went to Cheadle Hulme (Manchester Warehousemen and Clerks’ Orphan) School, their father having died. Clarke became a House Captain and then School Captain in 1937. He captained the school lacrosse team and led the scout troop.
He went on to work in the Meteorological Department of the Air Ministry before leaving to join the RAF on a short service commission in June 1939.
After completing his training and converting to Hurricanes, Clarke joined No 504 Squadron on 13 April 1940. On 11 September he was shot down in combat over the Kent coast, in Hurricane P 3770, and reported ‘Missing’. The CO, Squadron Leader John Sample, DFC, wrote to Arthur Clarke’s mother saying that nobody on the squadron had seen what had happened and holding out the faint hope that he had come down in the Channel and become a prisoner of the Germans. No such news came and Clarke’s name was placed on the Runnymede Memorial, Panel 7.
Much later, however, an investigation of an aircraft that crashed and burned out near Newchurch on Romney Marsh proved that it was Hurricane P 3770. The remains of Pilot Officer Clarke were still in the cockpit.
Relatives decided he should lie undisturbed and a memorial was placed at the side of the road close to the crash site. It was dedicated on 11 September 1986, the 46th anniversary of Arthur Clarke’s death.
