RAF North Pickenham
About
RAF North Pickenham, near Swaffham in Norfolk, opened in 1944 as a United States Army Air Forces base, Station 143. It was first used by the 492nd Bombardment Group, whose Consolidated B-24 Liberators suffered such heavy losses in a few weeks that the group was withdrawn, and then by the 491st Bombardment Group, which flew B-24s to the war’s end and won a Distinguished Unit Citation. After the war the airfield had a second life as a Thor ballistic-missile site between 1958 and 1963. It is now a turkey farm and wind farm, with a karting circuit on the old perimeter track.
Sources: This page was compiled from publicly available historical sources, including North Pickenham — Airfields of Britain Conservation Trust and RAF North Pickenham — Wikipedia. The text is original and has been written from factual source material; no source text has been copied unless specifically quoted and attributed.
Photographs
ⓘ licence & credit
assumed USAAF / Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:491bg-b24-2.jpgView source & full licence →ⓘ licence & credit
assumed USAAF / Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:491bg-b24-1.jpgView source & full licence →ⓘ licence & credit
British Government / Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Northpickenham-31jan46.pngView source & full licence →No people are cross-referenced to this airfield yet. Links appear as squadron postings, crews and service records are added.