FEATURE
Greenham and Crookham Commons - Part 1 A photographic study documenting some legacies from the airfield’s past through to the present day. ROBERT C CARPENTER LRPS
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have lived in the Newbury area for nearly 50 years and, for the first 30 years or so, the Greenham and Crookham Commons (Greenham Common) were always imposing and mysterious areas of land on the south side of the town. This mystery was only alleviated on occasional airbase Open Days and then the official opening of the common in 2000. Greenham Common, and in particular the airbase, has undergone a series of dramatic changes over its operational life and a short history is offered to help to illustrate the effects, geographical implications and legacies of some of these changes. More detailed presentations of the history of the airbase can be found in the references at the end of this article. Greenham Common’s more recent changes began in 1941, when the Air Ministry requisitioned the land to build an airfield and construction of the initial
airfield runway started early in 1942. It was to be an RAF Bomber Command Operational Training Unit with the main runway 5,988 feet in length, two secondary runways and many hard-standing dispersal areas. Accommodation, bomb storage sites and other installations were widely spaced over the surrounding local countryside. A period of expansion followed with the 51st Troop Carrier wing arriving from America in September 1942 to take part in Operation Torch and in October 1943 Greenham Common became USAAF (US Army Air Force) Station 486 and was handed over to the 9th Air Force. Part of the planning for D Day operations, in mid 1943, required the construction of the Waco and later Horsa gliders. This also required a significant effort to build accommodation blocks, workshops and associated utilities. March 1944 marked the arrival of the 438th
Figure 1 Greenham Common airfield showing a 1944 map of the Class A airfield with its 3 runways and dispersal areas. The bomb stores to the North East and the glider marshalling areas at either end of the main runway can be clearly seen. 10
