RAF Bramcote

RAF Bramcote opened on 5 June 1940 in Warwickshire, roughly four miles south-east of Nuneaton. For its first years it served RAF Bomber Command as a training and operational base, and it is best remembered for its strong association with Polish airmen who had escaped to Britain after the fall of their homeland.

The station hosted No. 18 Operational Training Unit, which prepared Polish crews on the Vickers Wellington, and was the cradle of four Polish bomber squadrons — Nos. 300, 301, 304 and 305 — which formed here flying the Fairey Battle before re-equipping with Wellingtons. Other resident units included No. 215 Squadron with Wellingtons and Ansons, and No. 151 Squadron operating Hawker Hurricanes and Boulton Paul Defiants. From 1943 the airfield passed to Transport Command, with No. 105 (Transport) Operational Training Unit flying Wellingtons and Douglas Dakotas.

In 1946 the site was transferred to the Royal Navy and commissioned as HMS Gamecock, supporting Fleet Air Arm reserve flying with aircraft such as the Supermarine Seafire through the 1950s. Flying ceased and the station closed on 10 November 1958. The following year the site passed to the British Army, becoming Gamecock Barracks, the role under which much of the former airfield survives today.