Airfield

The control tower:

Photo: Sarah Standley

The Deopham Airfield was constructed by the Americans in 1943 after which it became home to the 452^nd Bombardment Group of the United States 8^th Army Air Force, equipped with B17 Flying Fortresses and flying missions over Europe.
Handed back to the RAF in 1945, it was closed in 1948 and sold off in 1959. Several runways, hangars and an air raid shelter remain.

Another view of the control tower:

Photo courtesy of Martin Jeffery

A superb detailed photographic record of the airfield is accessible here.

There is also information on the 452^nd Bomb Group at their website here; they have a couple of photos of the airbase whilst it was operational here .

The following is an old picture taken on the airfield sometime in 1944/5. It was taken from the control tower looking north towards Hingham and shows activity on the 728BS revetment area. (The revetment was a barricade of earth or sandbags set up to provide protection from blasts and to prevent aircraft from overrunning when landing.)

Thanks to Martin Jeffery for supplying this photo.

The following image was taken looking from the airfield towards Deopham; the trees in the distance are at the edge of Red Brick House on the Stalland (Stalland Apiaries).

1955

After the war, roads that had been closed were reassessed. The road across the Stalland was authorised for permanent closure, being replaced by a new right of way using one of the former runways. The document and map below record this: the road in red is the one that is to be “stopped up” being replaced by the one coloured in blue.

Date	Change
18/9/23	Photo towards the Stalland
16/8/23	Photo of revetment area
1/8/23	Link to external websites
25/6/23	Added photo of control tower
22/9/22	Published