• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team
  • HI folks the server that hosts the site completely died including the Hdd's and backups.
    Luckily i create an offsite backup once a week! this has now been restored so we have lost a few days posts.
    im still fixing things at the moment so bear with me and im still working on all images 90% are fine the others im working on now
    we are now using a backup solution

1941 Air crash on or near Tyburn Road

A

AGarrett

Guest
Hi,

I am researching my Grandfather's death in an air accident on 12th October 1941. Your forum has a lot of information about the barrage balloons around Birmingham (it was a cable that brought my grandfather's 'plane down) so I am hoping there might already be some local knowledge of the accident (I know the barrage balloon thread is in a different section but I didn't want to double-post and this message crosses between both topics).

At the time he was a Flight Lieutenant in the RAF Volunteer Reserve and the first commander of 495 Squadron (Air Training Corps). I have contacted the coroner for the inquest records (which I hope to see when I visit Birmingham in the first week of August) and I have an original newspaper (The Birmingham Mail) for 16th October showing a photograph of his funeral cortege.

I would really appreciate pointers to other potential local sources, like any possible witness accounts. Ideally I would like to find the sites of the local airfields at the time and the exact crash site too. Any and all guidance gratefully received.

Many thanks,

Anthony.
 
495 (Sutton Coldfield) Squadron,
Air Training Corps
Training Ship
Sutton Coldfield
Stonehouse Road
Boldmere Gate
Sutton Park
Sutton Coldfield
West Midlands
B73 6LH Your G/Father would i think would have been stationed at Castle Bromwich airfield. Len.
 
Thanks Len. Can you explain a little further why you believe he would have been stationed at Castle Bromwich? Was that where most of the squadron was stationed?

Anthony
 
Hello Anthony, Welcome to the forum, please post your G/Fathers initials and were he is is buried that info will be very useful to the helpful forum members. Len.
 
His name was Albert Edward Garrett and he was in 495 Squadron. He is buried in Sutton Coldfield cemetery - plot 590 (which is in section 11 if that's of any use).

Anthony
 
I will ask my mom if she can recall any details. She lived very near the airfield and not far from Tyburn Road.
 
AnnieH said:
I will ask my mom if she can recall any details. She lived very near the airfield and not far from Tyburn Road.
Click to expand...

Thanks - it would be great if she can recall anything about it.
 
Dear Anthony
Really sorry, but mom has no recollection of the event at all. :( I hope that you will find others who can help you with your questions.
Regards
Ann
 
Hello Anthony.

Not sure if this has any bearing on what you are trying to find.....but.....My mother used to tell me that a plane came down somewhere in Washwood Heath near to the Beaufort Cinema (that kind of area), Not a million miles away from the Tyburn area....Unfortunatley mom is no longer with us but I do remember her telling me about this she would only of been a yongster then. She also said that the middle of the dual carriageway from the Beautfort down towards Burney Lane was an air raid shelter.


Shady
 
Shady :

I was born in 1939 and would have been 2 years old when the plane crash took place that you speak of.
At thAt time we lived in Flaxley Road, Stechford and my mother would push me in a pushchair down to some shops at the bottom of Flaxley Road in order to do day-to-day shopping.
On one occasion she said that an aircraft, very low and clearly in trouble, flew across the sky and disappeared behind the Atlas Cinema, after which she heard it crash.
She said it was so low that she could see the pilot and his headgear. It must be the same plane that you are talking about.
 
Hi

Not sure if you have looked on this site www.rafcommands.com which is similar to this one, they are marvellous at giving replies to things like this, after 60 years of searching they told me all about my cousins crash and I have since been able to find most of the family of the crew members. Hope this helps - give them all the info you have and you will be suprised at what comes up.

Dyan in NZ
 
On the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve website there are a couple of photos of your grandfather.
 
AGarrett, Your G/Fathers photo taken from the RAF Volunteer Reserve website. Len.
Garrett Albert Edward
Garrett_AE_01_s.JPG
Garrett_AE_02_s.JPG

Son of Albert Edward Garrett, and Ellen Elizabeth Dedman.
Married Winifred Grace Brooman, of Sutton Coldfield; two sons.
 
Tyburn Road had attracted Luftwaffe attention on 3/9/1940 when the Dunlop factory and Arthur Scrivenors Limited were damaged by a delayed action bomb. Perhaps this was the reason for barrage balloons being in the area. Info from WW2talk forum.
 
Gunsites in Birmingham, Balloon would be nearby, more to follow. Len. ​
paperclip.png
Attached Thumbnails
 
AGarrett, Its possible that a balloon from one these sites in the area of Tyburn Rd broke free and caused this very sad event, i witnessed the damage the trailing wires could cause,wrecked chimney stacks & roofs etc. Len.
No. 31 (BALLLON BARRAGE) GROUP, BIRMINGHAM.

(Air Commodore J. C. Quinnell)



No. 5 Balloon Centre, Sutton Coldfield.

911 48 balloons West Bromwich

913 40 balloons Sutton Coldfield

962 24 balloons Milford Haven

(9 waterborne)



No. 6 Balloon Centre, Wythall Near Alvechurch, Birmingham.

914 40 balloons Northfield

915 40 balloons Rowkeath

916 32 balloons Coventry

917 24 ballons Coventry
 
Hi

Sorry to be a nuisance but could you give me the RAFVR site addy please. I am looking for some of the crew members of my cousins plane that crashed in WW2. Thanks

Dyan
 
Last edited:
I don't know if the query that started this thread got answered , but I remember (very clearly) a Harvard trainer taking off from Castle Bromwich and just after it passed over our house , it nosedived straight into the front yard of Parkinson's Stoves . I cannot remember if it was early or late war .
I also remember a barrage balloon coming rolling past the bottom of our garden at about 250 feet , winding its cable round itself and making an undescribable noise but that was widely separated in time from the aircraft crash .
I do not believe that there ever was a crash on the Tyburn Road , we lived near to it and Castle Bromwich and would have surely known about it .
The crash in Parkinson's must have been after the blitz , because I remember Parkinson's in flames after being bombed , and the plane crashed into a freshly concreted yard .
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top