Military

A POPPY Cross is placed each year at the Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment memorial at Helensburgh’s Kidston to mark Remembrance Day — and in 2021 it had special significance.

The memorial, erected by Helensburgh Heritage Trust and the Airfields Conservation Trust, not only commemorates those killed while serving with RAF Helensburgh during World War Two, but also the hundreds of men and women who once served there.

THE SEARCH is on for information about some of the people who served at the Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment on Garelochside during World War Two.

The images with this article are of members of staff at the establishment, which was officially known as RAF Helensburgh.

THE Facebook post was succinct: “Afghanistan, I weep for you.” The surprise was that the author runs a bed and breakfast establishment at Arrochar.

RAF HELENSBURGH had on its books during World War Two the last two Supermarine Stranraer twin-engined flying boats operated by the RAF.

OF THE scores of flying boats and seaplanes belonging to RAF Helensburgh during World War Two, only one remains today.

ARTISTS, photographers, wordsmiths, all had a role to play at RAF Helensburgh during World War Two.

RAF HELENSBURGH had close links with the Blackburn Aircraft Company in Dumbarton during World War Two.

A YOUNG Helensburgh army officer who served in Britain’s only Mountain Division in World War Two lost his life in a seaborn attack.

A HELENSBURGH man lost his life piloting a bomber in a night raid on the industrial Ruhr area of Germany during World War Two.

A TEST pilot at RAF Helensburgh during World War Two had a son who he would be very proud of.

A MEMBER of a well-known Loch Longside family, who was honoured after a successful military career, also had a colourful private life.

Major Charles James Brooman-White CBE, whose son was to become Under-Secretary of State at the Scottish Office, had the odd problem with the law in his youth, was named in a divorce action, and in later life left his wife to live with another woman.

VOO-DOO was used once in World War Two. Its use in 1943 is not widely known, and less so its link to Helensburgh.

‘Voo-doo’ was a Hadrian glider towed across the Atlantic Ocean by a two-engined Dakota.  The dangerous, never before attempted mission took off from Montreal in Canada.