Matching
AirfieldIWM, English Heritage Collection
Built in 1943 as an Eighth Air Force bomber base, Matching was transferred to the Ninth Air Force and first occupied in January 1944 by the 391st Bomb Group, equipped with B-26s. The station had three concrete runways, 50 loop hardstandings and two dispersed T2 hangars. After the 391st Bomb Group moved to France in September 1944, the station was handed over to the RAF, although C-47s of IX Troop Carrier Command were detached to Matching later in 1944 for exercises with British paratroops. Closed in 1945, the station quickly reverted to agriculture and the concrete areas were mostly removed for road hardcore. In the late 1980s, one T2 hangar was dismantled and transferred to North Weald Airfield. The Control Tower remains in use as a radar equipment test facility owned by Raytheon (previously Cossor electronics).
Connections
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People
- Military/Civilian/Mascot: Military
- Nationality: American
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 573rd Bomb Squadron
- Service Numbers: 19102402 / O-751078
- Highest Rank: First Lieutenant
- Role/Job: Pilot
- Military/Civilian/Mascot: Military
- Nationality: American
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 575th Bomb Squadron
- Service Numbers: 19101923 / O-746676
- Highest Rank: Major
- Role/Job: Bombardier / Navigator
- Military/Civilian/Mascot: Military
- Nationality: American
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 575th Bomb Squadron
- Service Numbers: 16136624 / O-824081
- Highest Rank: Second Lieutenant
- Role/Job: Co-pilot
- Military/Civilian/Mascot: Military
- Nationality: American
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 574th Bomb Squadron
- Service Numbers: O-715127
- Highest Rank: Second Lieutenant
- Role/Job: Co-pilot
- Military/Civilian/Mascot: Military
- Nationality: American
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 574th Bomb Squadron
- Service Numbers: 18161864 / O-558793
- Highest Rank: Second Lieutenant
- Role/Job: Bomb / Navigator
Aircraft
- Aircraft Type: B-26 Marauder
- Nicknames: Jinx, Snakes Revenge
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 574th Bomb Squadron
- Aircraft Type: B-26 Marauder
- Nicknames: Old Sarge
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 574th Bomb Squadron
- Aircraft Type: B-26 Marauder
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 575th Bomb Squadron
- Aircraft Type: B-26 Marauder
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 574th Bomb Squadron
- Aircraft Type: B-26 Marauder
- Unit: 391st Bomb Group 573rd Bomb Squadron
Revisions
Barry Anderson, Army Air Forces Stations (Alabama, 1985) / Roger Freeman, Airfields of the Eighth Then And Now (London, 1978)
Roger Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Manual (2nd edn, London, 2001)
Roger Freeman, Airfields of the Ninth Then and Now (London, 1994)
Michael Bowyer, Action Stations 1: Wartime Military Airfields of East Anglia 1939-1945 (Cambridge, 1979)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Matching
http://www.wartime-airfields.com/usaaf-station-161-matching-green.html