RAF Folkingham

RAF Folkingham lay in Lincolnshire, some miles south of the village from which it took its name. Built during the war and brought into use in 1943-44, it was constructed to bomber-airfield standards with paved runways but spent its operational life chiefly in the airborne-forces role rather than as a heavy-bomber station of Bomber Command.

For most of its wartime career the airfield was handed to the United States Army Air Forces, where it was known as USAAF Station 484. It served as a troop-carrier and parachute base, home at various times to transport squadrons flying Douglas C-47 Skytrains and, later, Curtiss C-46 Commandos. In the run-up to the Normandy landings of June 1944 it was used by American airborne troops, and the 313th Troop Carrier Group operated from the station before moving to a forward strip in France early in 1945.

After the war the site found a varied second life. British Racing Motors used it as a test track in 1949, and at the height of the Cold War it was rebuilt as a Thor intermediate-range ballistic missile base, with No. 223 Squadron operating the rockets from 1959 until 1963. Following final closure the land reverted largely to agriculture and light industrial use, with surviving stretches of concrete and dispersal still visible today.