New Ely museum honours two key World War Two RAF stations

A museum has paid tribute to two former RAF stations that played vital roles in Bomber Command operations during World War Two.

The RAF Witchford and Mepal Museum has opened on Lancaster Way Business Park in Ely, Cambridgeshire, to show the contribution RAF Witchford and RAF Mepal made to the Lancaster bombers' offensive.

Grovemere Property bought RAF Witchford from the Ministry of Defence after the war and redeveloped the site.

"It really is just amazing that we are now home to all these wonderful items and can ensure that the experiences and sacrifices of those connected with the two airfields are remembered and understood by future generations," Thomas Brand, from the firm, said.

In 2024 the Brand family, which owns Grovemere Property, decided to create a new free purpose-built museum following the closure of the RAF Witchford Exhibition, which was located in the foyer of an office building on the business park.

Brand, a joint managing director of Grovemere Property whose grandfather bought the former RAF Witchford airfield, said the origins of the new museum could be traced to an excavation of a Lancaster bomber crash site at nearby Coveney in 1995.

"The project was supported by Grovemere Property, after local historian Barry Aldridge, who spent decades documenting RAF Witchford's history, got in touch," he said.

Aldridge, who died in 2016, had connections to the airfield that stretched back to childhood, when he explored its derelict buildings.

Artefacts recovered during the Coveney dig included a Lancaster engine, which later became a key exhibit in the previous RAF Witchford Exhibition, and is now the centrepiece at the new museum.

Brand said that many local people had donated items for the museum, which had given him "goosebump" moments.

"Recently a man gave me an old suitcase which contained his late father's RAF uniform, his medals, flight logs, flying helmet and a personal journal that documented his time in the RAF, it was incredible to see," he said.

Brand also said he had witnessed some emotional visitors who had found pictures of their loved ones displayed as part of the exhibit.

He did not disclose how much the museum cost to set-up, but said it was now being run as a charity "to help ensure its long-term future".

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