Our next meeting will be on:

Wednesday 22^nd May 2024, 7.30pm, Dorchester Abbey Shrine Chapel, Members free, Visitors welcome (£5).

Bill King will speak on

Mount Farm, Berinsfield: its wartime history

This talk covers the short but significant life of the RAF airfield which became RAF Mount Farm. As war clouds gathered during the mid-1930s the Royal Air Force expanded and sites for new airfields were surveyed. The area around Mount Farm was selected as suitable and the land requisitioned. Building commenced in 1938 and the site was ready for use by July 1940, Originally known as Dorchester but quickly renamed Mount Farm it was designated as a satellite of RAF Benson. Throughout the war RAF Mount Farm played host to bombers and later to RAF photographic reconnaissance aircraft, and from February 1943 to the photographic reconnaissance squadrons of the US Eighth Air Force who remained until the end of the war in Europe in May 1945. Aircraft from Mount Farm contributed immensely to the successful strategic bombing campaigns and the preparation for the liberation of Europe. As the war ended flying ceased and the base was quickly run down returning to agriculture and in 1957 to gravel extraction. Today little remains of the site from which so many sorties were flown but the story of its short life deserves to be told.

Bill King, now retired from a busy career as an independent management consultant, came from a naval family. Starting from a keen early interest in Britain’s history, his research on military and political history ultimately focused on WW2 with particular reference to the role of Airborne and Special Forces and clandestine warfare, including the British Resistance Organisation (Auxiliary Units). He has published many book chapters and articles, is a former Chairman of the Ridgeway Military and Aviation Research Group (RMARG) and a member of The Western Front Association and of the Military Vehicle Trust. He has also taken part in local radio, acted as historical adviser and appeared in several television programmes, and gives talks on a wide range of topics.

In these unprecedented times we are sadly unable to plan any meetings for the foreseeable future.

We had hoped to carry over 2020 meetings into 2021 but cannot yet offer speakers possible dates or guarantee suitable arrangements in any local venue. We have also ruled out trying to provide ZOOM talks, as these would not reach all our membership, or other members of the public, and not all speakers can offer this technology.

However, we hope everyone who has explored the links on YouTube has enjoyed and learnt new facts about our village from Malcolm Airs’ three live walks around the village – perhaps you have now walked round yourselves to look at the features he has shown us. Thank you so much to our Honorary President for providing us with these stimulating, informative and fascinating guides to our heritage.

We also hope our members have enjoyed receiving news from the Oxfordshire Local History Association, which offers a wide range of talks and information online and draws attention to events and new publications.

If anyone is interested in pursuing their own local research – on their family or house, for example – or have questions on Dorchester history they would like answered, we’d be happy to help.

We shall postpone our customary January AGM until February or later. Meanwhile, your committee will continue to monitor the situation, and hope to give you better news in the New Year.

Margot Metcalfe, Chairman

The March/April/May Historical Society talks have been postponed until the pandemic situation is clearer. Our membership/regular attendees are in the ‘vulnerable’ category, and we don’t want to take any risks.

To mark our 60th anniversary we are focusing on our founder, Edith Gratia Stedman OBE (whose corbel you can see on the Abbey wall), and how, although a newcomer and an American, she initiated and inspired so many activities, including the Museum, such that her legacy can be seen today.

We are developing a new and lasting exhibit featuring Edith and would greatly appreciate help in the form of ‘Edith’ anecdotes, documents and artefacts. We have most of her pamphlets and booklets, such as ‘A Yankee in an English Village’, but any of the following would be much appreciated, as donations or loans:

• Photographs or newspaper articles featuring Edith or the museum
• letters, articles, old museum minutes
• pieces of the commemorative china she ordered for sale in the museum, like the jug below
• a pristine copy of the original Monastery cookbook
• one of the pebbles from the driveway up from the lychgate, laid down by Amey from the gravel pit, which Edith had identified as Second Ice Age larvae set in pumice, and then sold for a shilling each in the museum as ‘Fiddlestones’!

Please feel free to contact me on 340054, or come into the Museum on any Thursday morning in March, 10-12.

Margot Metcalfe, Museum archivist

We have just added the ‘historical society’ dates for 2019 to the site, and also added some details for the February meet.  We will update the events as we get more information.

Dorchester historical society