PUBLIC PLACES
Rock garden
Monarch butterfly
cricket square and this is used by employees, local cricket teams and local scout group. SAS UK is a community in itself and we’re proud of the role we also play in our local and wider community.” “We are an official partner of British Rowing and back in 2018, ahead of the Glasgow European Championships, we organised a ‘Job Swap’ between two golfers on the Ladies’ European Tour and two athletes from the GB Rowing team.”
“With both sports being represented at the inaugural European Championships, British golfers Amy Boulden and Annabel Dimmock changed places with athletes from the GB Rowing Team, Tom George and Alan Sinclair. After splitting into teams, the pairs battled it out in double scull boats over 150m down the River Thames in Marlow. After that, they came to us for a series of golf challenges on our course. It was a fun day for all involved and even made the local
Operation Crossbow
Operation Crossbow was the codename for a vital military operation to find V1 and V2 bases in northern Europe, primarily in northern France. Located at RAF Medmenham, 60 miles to the west of London, it was here that RAF personnel interpreted reconnaissance photographs and passed on their findings to higher authorities.
Reconnaissance pilots flew modified unarmed Spitfires that were fitted with five powerful cameras, which reduced their weight and increased their speed. They were painted a grey-blue colour so that they blended in with the sky, as their optimum flight height was 30,000 feet. If by chance they were attacked, it was generally considered that the Spitfires had the necessary speed to escape any attacker, until the introduction of the Nazi’s ME-262 jet fighter.
Once a reconnaissance Spitfire had landed, the cameras were taken off and the stills processed and studied. The photographs were put into three categories depending on whether they were of value. They were studied by highly skilled Photographic Interpreters (PI’s) at RAF Medmenham and it was up to them to sort the images into the various categories.
114 PC October/November 2019
If a photo was deemed to be of great interest, a further reconnaissance flight was ordered so that a collection of more detailed photographs could be taken. Overlapping images allowed the PI’s to build up a 3D image of what it was that had interested them in the first place. These types of images gave accurate heights and widths – both vital in trying to work out the content of the photographs.
The campaign against the V1 and V2s started when an inquisitive pilot noticed what to him were odd buildings and curious shapes on the ground at a place called Peenemünde, which up to that time was unknown to British intelligence. This was compounded by French resistance information that notified the British of a number of newly built complexes or building projects near to the north French coast.
These were investigated by the reconnaissance pilots, who now had to fly in at a very low level putting themselves in danger of intense anti- aircraft gunfire, which convinced them that what they were photographing was of great importance. In fact, they had discovered the existence of the V1 and the work done at RAF Mendenham led to a major attack on Peenemünde on August 17-18, 1943.
The V2 was also identified by the PIs, but because it was a weapon that could be moved and was invariably launched in woodland, bombing raids would not work. Peenemünde had been virtually destroyed but this resulted in the factories being rebuilt inside of mountains near Nördhausen where they were safe from bombing. The threat from the V2s remained until Nördhausen was overrun by the Americans. It was only then that the brutality behind the V2 was observed as the labourers at Nördhausen came from the nearby Dora concentration camp, where thousands of inmates died during the war.
There can be no doubt that the work done by the reconnaissance pilots and the PIs at RAF Medmenham was vital to the war effort.
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