The story of the Shorts Stirling that crashed in the village

The aircraft arrived over the target but 10/10ths cloud covered the whole area and finding the target was impossible. The bombing force came under heavy anti-aircraft fire and W7521 was hit and damaged. After releasing its bombs it turned for home. A decoy site 15 miles north of Stuttgart attracted some bombs but the Bosch factory remained untouched.

After 6 hours flying the damaged Stirling crossed the channel. The crew were relieved to be over home soil because it meant that should they have needed to bail out  it would be over friendly terrain rather than enemy held countries or the cold North Sea.  The aircraft was still going despite the damage sustained but as it reached Norfolk, the engines began to cut out, (there was an airlock in the fuel system), the pilot had to find somewhere to land and fast. 

Gerry Collins, then 10 years old, takes up the story "At about 5 o'clock in the morning I was woken by the sound of aircraft engines, they circled around and then there was a loud bang and the engines stopped.  My father and uncle went outside carrying a shotgun and a torch as they did not know if it was an English or a German aircraft that had crashed. In the darkness they heard a voice shouting "We are English, don't shoot". The torch soon picked out the roundels on the side of RAF aircraft. Three of the crew were helped back to our house. The pilots were uninjured but the rear gunner was in need of medical help. The other crew members were taken to another house".

As the Stirling crash landed it hit a tree breaking off a wing and continued along the field demolishing a chicken hutch on the way, ending up in a ditch with its back broken. It had stopped 100 meters away from "Brecon Lodge" or " Woodlands" as it was known then. The field is behind the new housing development.

The crew, Pilot Officer RICHARDS, Sergeant G MCAULEY, Sergeant G L A NEALS, Sergeant S E STEAVENS, Sergeant  B W ROBERTS, Sergeant STRONNELL, Sergeant E NETTLETON and Sergeant  A E BURKITT  all survived and were taken away later by the RAF to Marham. An armed guard was placed around the W7521 and over the next two weeks it was dismantled and removed by Queen Mary transport lorries back to RAF Marham.