Copmanthorpe

[Alan Bentley]

Hello Chris

I am a bit puzzled which is not uncommon at my age!

Re Kavala - Are you referring to the article which was published about four years ago by my Greek friends. If so I can't make the connection between me and Copmanthorpe except of course through my father. If it would be of any interest to your site ,then fine, but as I say ,I am puzzled.

Best wishes

Alan

[Chris Robinson]

Yes it is  that article! A Google search using your fathers name ( I was looking for any online evidence of  his RAF service) brought the Kavala article up. As you might expect there are other people with the same name but it quickly became clear this article was about your father. We are keen to learn about anyone who served at Copmanthorpe but we have had little information before.

The only evidence today that the airfield ever existed is Drome Road, which led to it. This is off Temple Lane which is sole evidence of the 12th century Knights Templar in the same area but that is another story. The airfield site is still farmers fields. 

Best wishes, Chris

 

Edited 5 November , 2022 by Chris Robinson
Typing correction

[Alan Bentley]

My fathers Service record is on page one of this posting.My father was Herbert John (Jack) Peacock

You may use any or all of it with the usual proviso and that I get to see the final result.The same goes for the Kavala report altough my wife prefers that her picture is left out!

Edited 5 November , 2022 by Alan Bentley

[Chris Robinson]

Thanks for this and will comply. I am minded to restrict our interest to the Airfield photos and not put your fathers record and the Kavala account into further circulation. A name for one of the airmen in the photos is really aa much we need locally, and even having that is a bonus  for us. 

Chris 

[Alan Bentley]

Thanks for that Chris. I am only too happy to help in any way I can.

In my fathers collection of small photo albums are pictures of Tadcaster,but I think Tadcaster is outside your area. Do you know of anyone who might be interested?

[Chris Robinson]

I can pass onto Tadcaster Historical Society where I am also  member. As it happens all this came about because I went to a talk at Tadcaster HS on Thursday about Tadcaster/Bramham airfield (it changed its name) and the fliers based there. I think Tad was in use later than Copmanthorpe. One of the hangars still exists, in use for agriculture and now listed by English Heritage. 

[sadbrewer]

If it's of interest....courtesy of the British Newspaper Archive. 

 

 

Tadcaster came up for disposal in March 1921.

 

Edited 9 November , 2022 by sadbrewer

[Chris Robinson]

6

9 minutes ago, sadbrewer said:

If it's of interest....courtesy of the British Newspaper Archive. 

 

 

Tadcaster came up for disposal in March 1921.

 

I can pass onto Tadcaster Historical Society where I am also  member. As it happens all this came about because I went to a talk at Tadcaster HS on Thursday about Tadcaster/Bramham airfield (it changed its name) and the fliers based there. I think Tad was in use later than Copmanthorpe. One of the hangars still exists, in use for agriculture and now listed by English Heritage. 

Thanks for this. Very interesting. Chris 

[sadbrewer]

2 hours ago, Chris Robinson said:

6

I can pass onto Tadcaster Historical Society where I am also  member. As it happens all this came about because I went to a talk at Tadcaster HS on Thursday about Tadcaster/Bramham airfield (it changed its name) and the fliers based there. I think Tad was in use later than Copmanthorpe. One of the hangars still exists, in use for agriculture and now listed by English Heritage. 

Thanks for this. Very interesting. Chris 

Judging by the newspapers there is no record of flying at Copmanthorpe after the War Ministry sale...the only mentions are of the site being hunted over by the Ainsty Hunt...and references to Aerodrome Farm.

Likewise Tadcaster, no newspaper references after the disposal notice until 1930 when it comes under consideration as a site for Leeds Gliding Club, it was rejected as being too far from Leeds.

Interesting snippet....

 

[sadbrewer]

One for the historical society if they haven't already picked it up.

 

 

As an aside, my Mum's cousin Douglas Heath was for many years the organist at one of Tadcaster's churches...he was a Pathfinder navigator during WW2.

Edited 9 November , 2022 by sadbrewer

[Chris Robinson]

I think you are right about no further flying from Copmanthorpe and suspect you are also right about Tadcaster. Flying from the latter may have been transferred to Sherburn in Elmet an airfield still in operation.

There is reportedly an article in the Times of Friday 25 April 1919 that Copmanthorpe was one of 12 airports in a chain considered to allow civilian flights from London to Edinburgh (Copmanthorpe being between Doncaster and Catterick) but I do not think there is any evidence such flights ever took place!

[Alan Bentley]

Whoops!

This is the road to Copmanthorpe

[Andrew Upton]

2 minutes ago, Alan Bentley said:

Whoops!

This is the road to Copmanthorpe

And the right way up :-)

[Chris Robinson]

I can pass onto Tadcaster Historical Society where I am also  member. As it happens all this came about because I went to a talk at Tadcaster HS on Thursday about Tadcaster/Bramham airfield (it changed its name) and the fliers based there. I think Tad was in use later than Copmanthorpe. One of the hangars still exists, in use for agriculture and now listed by English Heritage. 

Yes this is the view from the railway bridge, no station now but has become part of the London - Edinburgh main line, as well as York to Leeds and beyond, so a very busy line. I will replicate this shot and post it for comparison! We have photos of the railway and the long closed station but not of the road!

[Chris Robinson]

I now attach photo taken today (Remembrance Day by coincidence) showing the same view as far as is possible due to bushes now grown on the left hand slope and a tree blocking the view forward! the allotments date from at least 1892 and are still evident. the road is Temple Lane named from the Knights Templar site of which there is no trace. the road now past the site of the airfield is Drome Road appropriately. The main village of Copmanthorpe is on higher land behind the camera on the other side of the railway. at the time it had a few hundred population but with expansion mainly in the 1960s and 1970s it is now about 4000, as it is only 4 miles to the centre of York. 

is the date of the photograph known? I would guess at 1917 but it could be into 1918. 

I have a 1991 booklet by Trevor Wright entitled "Knights Templar - The Copmanthorpe Squadrons of the Royal Flying Corps 1916 to 1918 which I should be able to scan onto about 12 pages so will do this and post it if you wish. 

[Alan Bentley]

M fathers RAF record for the relevant period reads -

Scampton to 7 W.Wkps. Sqd (?) 26/12/19

7W.Wkps.Sqd to M.Sect MDS 2/3/20

M.Sect. to Tadcaster 5/3/20

Tadcaster to 2 N ARD (Sheffield - 20/4/20

There is no direct reference to Copmanthorpe in his record, so the geographical facts would point to the pictures being taken between the end of 1919 and April 1920. He became an avid photographer later in his RAF career. He served RNAS/RAF from 1914 to 1939  .Service No. 200287 which indicates that he was one of the first men to join the RNAS.

Edited 13 November , 2022 by Alan Bentley

[Chris Robinson]

My understanding is Copmanthorpe closed for flying not long after the war ended and Sadbrewer has already posted on this forum the disposal notice for auction of the airfield buildings etc on 22 October 1919. Despite the 2 airfields being about 10miles apart I have never seen any reference to any connection betwen the 2, or common posting of squadrons.

I have 2 books referring to Copmanthorpe so will peruse these and see if I can firm up some dates and come back on this. 

In the meantime a photo of your father would be great. Also you mentioned you might have photos from Bramham/Tadcaster (it changed names despite bring strictly in Bramham) and it would be great if you could send these and I can pass on to John Firth at Tadcaster Historical Society. 

[Chris Robinson]

I am working through what I know of the history of Copmanthorpe airfield but I am going to estimate the date as August 1918 or possibly August  1919

For month I am going by the full leaved trees plus the apparently parched grass. For year I note one of the planes SE5a registered F7965 was one of a batch ordered from Austin on 24 June 1918. For an end date I note the airfield and its buildings etc was to be sold by auction on 22 October 1919., having been decommissioned some months earlier. I assume the field was still useable after decommission. 

Re your father's service in August 1918 he was at Howden which is about 15/20 miles from Copmanthorpe (Howden later famed for Barnes Wallis) and in 1919 was at Scampton which is about 50/60 miles from Copmanthorpe. Chris 

[Alan Bentley]

[Chris Robinson]

What a wonderful photograph of your father. It says so much, the nonchalant pipe smoking pose, the much used overalls, and the eyes looking straight at camera! Do you know the Year and place of this photo? What is the cap badge? I noted some of his service was at Howden, famous for airships. Was he serving on airships? I doubt we ever saw one of them in Copmanthorpe!

As the war was ending and in the following year, as airfields closed, there may have been a degree of "social" flying with spare planes handy? Copmanthorpe was very handy for a jaunt into York! Conjecture I know!

[Alan Bentley]

The picture is from his Tadcaster album which starts with " Tadcaster during the railway strike Sept 1919"The strike stared on the 24th Sept 1919. So that places the album. He smoked a pipe all his life and died from lung cancer in 1959.He served nearly 3 years with 2 Wing RNAS in the Aegean.By the end of the war he had flown more than 300 hours as an airship engineer in England.

In the 1920s he did two tours in Iraq and in the 1930s he took his family to the NWFP of India for nearly four years. Finally retired as a Flight Sergeant at RAF Abingdon in 1939. " No more war for me!"

I will put the Tadcaster album on this Forum later, hopefully the right way up!

[Chris Robinson]

Smoking was normal then wasn't it. My father in law was a Lancaster rear gunner in WW2, never talked about it, a life long smoker and died of lung cancer aged 62. 

Your father seems to have had a very full service life even  more adventurous between the wars. 

I note the rail strike reference  in September 1919, interesting. I see from his service record he was stationed at Scampton then so wonder whether there was a tie up with Tadcaster. Or it may be his job as a flight engineer took him to bases he was  not stationed at. A fixer of problems they could not sort out locally? 

Scampton was of course the dam busters base in WW2 so an indirect link with Howden through Barnes Wallis!

[Chris Robinson]

I have found a record of an aircraft crash 1 mile from Tadcaster airport on 7 December 1918. The pilot was delivering a Sopwith Camel B7457 from Scampston to Tadcaster 34 TDS. Pilot 2nd lt David Ewan McConnell was killed. He had got lost in the fog. I was interested in this because it shows one reason pilots flew from Scampton to other airports, delivery of presumably new or refurbished aircraft! Perhaps the pilots had then to get back to home base on the train.