RAF Evanton/novar

RAF Evanton lay beside the Cromarty Firth in Easter Ross, in the Scottish Highlands. It first opened in 1922 under the name Novar, replacing the cramped landing ground at Delny House, and its early purpose was to support Fleet Air Arm aircraft that flew ashore from the Home Fleet’s carriers when the warships lay at anchor in nearby Invergordon.

The station was rebuilt and enlarged in 1937 to take on an armament-training role, becoming home to No. 8 Armament Training Camp and its successors. Through the late 1930s and the Second World War it operated as a bombing and gunnery school and, from June 1941, as No. 8 Air Gunners’ School, where many hundreds of gunners were trained on types such as the Blackburn Botha and Westland Lysander, alongside Fairey Battles, Bristol Blenheims and Hawker Henleys. The gunnery school disbanded in August 1944.

That autumn the airfield passed to the Royal Navy and was commissioned as HMS Fieldfare, serving as a Fleet Air Arm aircraft storage and repair base. It was reduced to care and maintenance in 1948, with flying tailing off through the early 1950s before final closure around 1956, though occasional civil flying lingered into the 1980s. The site today is an industrial estate, partly cut by the A9, with several wartime hangars still standing.