Boxted Airfield Museum

Description

The museum was officialy opened on the 29th of May 2011 by Henry Farwell, American veteran of the 386th Bomb Group based at Boxted in 1943.

The opening was the result of 10 years fundraising and 4 years construction.

The boxted Airfield Historical Group was formed in 2000. The group held fly-ins on the airfield between 2002 and 2006, and the small profit from these was used to start the fundraising.

In 2008 we became a registered charity and applied to the Heritage lottery fund for a grant. We were delighted when they allocated £34,000 for our project. This has funded the exhibition Nissen hut (an original from the airfield that has been restored). A second brand new Nissen hut was funded by our group from a building block fundraising initiative, and we use this building as a visitor centre.

The museum displays include the nose gearing mechanism from a P47 Thunderbolt, the largest piece of a B26 Marauder in the UK, the WW2 diary of the 386th bomb group, as well as artifacts from the airfield and general WW2 items. As well as the 386th the airfield was home to the 354th fighter group (the first unit to fly the merlin engined mustang) and the 56th most famous of the American fighter groups with more kills and more aces than any other group. The only Congressional medal of honour awarded to a fighter pilot flying in Europe was gived to Jim Howard stationed at Boxted. The first American Air Sea rescue suadron was formed at Boxted in 1944.

When the war ended the RAF used the base until 1947.

Pictures show outside of museum, some exhibits and Richard Turner (on left), chairman of Boxted Airfield Historical group, and Henry Farwell who opened the museum.