RAF Locking - History & Timeline
Hopefully you’ve just scanned the nearby QR code because you’d like to know a little more about the history of the ground on which you stand today, which lies within the bounds of the former Royal Air Force Station Locking.
The Early Years
1938 – Early in 1938 the Government purchased 250 acres of land near the village of Locking and warned adjacent landowners not to sell further land or property. Speculation about the land use ended when the House of Commons was notified of additional technical training camp requirements during the RAF Expansion Debate which took place on 12th May 1938.
1939 – RAF Locking opened as a training unit named No. 5 School of Technical Training. Its role was to train new entrants of the Royal Air Force and Fleet Air Arm in the trades of aircraft mechanics, airframe maintenance, carpentry, fabric working and parachute packing. Training of Marine Craft personnel also took place on this site.
1939-1941 – In just three years, 30,682 personnel had undertaken their training here.
1942 –
Fleet Air Arm training ceased at the end of the year with some 5,710 Naval Ratings having passed through the camp gates.
RAF training continued, and by the end of WW2, the station had developed into a huge settlement comprising of hutted accommodation, classrooms, offices, workshops and aircraft hangars. One of the many aircraft used in a training role took this aerial photograph of the camp, and the layout plan of 1944 will help you identify many of the buildings (though the orientation may need to be rotated through
180 degrees).
1947-1950 – Boy Entrant Training commenced at RAF Locking in 1947, but it gradually moved to other training establishments as overall manning reduced in a peacetime RAF.
No. 5 School of Technical Training closed in 1950 after just eleven years of operation.
1950 – No. 1 Radio School formed at RAF Locking. All trainees were to be adults and would comprise of Regular and National Service personnel who would eventually graduate as either Mechanics or Fitters in the Radio and Radar trade specialisations.
1952 – Aircraft Apprentice (Air and Ground Wireless and Radar) training moved from
RAF Cranwell to RAF Locking under the embrace of No. 1 Radio School.
1964 – A new trade structure was implemented which affected all RAF technical branches; Technical ranks were discontinued, and the trade structures were revised.
RAF Locking did not escape this revision, and this was to be the first of many iterations that the Ground Radar and Ground Wireless trades were to go through over the ensuing years.
In the early 1960s a major building programme commenced at Locking and over the next decade, the wooden hutted accommodation was demolished and replaced with fine brick buildings. This facilitated a high-quality training facility and provided comfortable living accommodation for its time. As can be seen in the aerial photograph below, the buildings were surrounded by pleasant and extensive green open space.
Notwithstanding this refurbishment, RAF numbers were once again soon in decline, and Apprentice training ceased in 1976.
Adult Airmen continued to be trained as Mechanics and Fitters and would pass out of No. 1 Radio School as either Electronic Mechanic or Electronic Fitter Ground Radar or Ground Communications personnel.
1978 – The trades were absorbed into a newly formed Trade Group, Trade Group 3, more commonly referred to as “TG3”. The new group comprised of three different specialisations covering Airfields (AF), Air Defence (AD) and Telecommunications (TC) and tradesmen, and tradeswomen, would pass out as either Mechanics or Junior Technicians.
1993 – Following a major review, the trade structure changed once again. The three trades were to amalgamate and become a single trade covering all three roles. The changes were rung in with a new name, and personnel became either Engineering Mechanics (Electrical) or Engineering Technicians (Electrical).
1999 – Saw the final demise of No. 1 Radio School at RAF Locking. The station’s closure was imminent, and throughout 1998 and 1999, a large number of personnel who had themselves been trained at RAF Locking dismantled the multiple communications and radar systems on which they had honed their skills and reinstalled them at the new home of No. 1 Radio School at RAF Cosford in a purpose-built state of the art facility called Flowerdown Hall. An official closure ceremony took place, with personnel of
No. 1 Radio School marching out of the gates of Royal Air Force Locking for the very last time.
RAF Locking Today
The station was consigned to the annals of history at 1600hrs on the 31st March 2000 during a formal ceremony which saw the Royal Air Force Ensign and the Command Pennant being lowered in the presence of the last remaining RAF presence, Squadron Leader Geoff Symes, who conducted the official closure and handover to the new owners. At midnight that day, ownership of the site passed to Defence Estates, and subsequently to the South-west Regional Development Agency.
Initially, there were hopes to develop the site in a way that would incorporate various leisure facilities, but sadly those hopes did not come to fruition.
The decision had already been made to demolish all technical and support buildings on the 81hectare site, with demolition work commencing in 2003 for completion in 2004.
North Somerset Council’s intentions for the site, to be known as “Locking Parklands”, was for an extensive development of new homes along with supporting infrastructure that included schools and a GP’s surgery.
The area comprising of the former airmen’s family’s quarters was renamed as “Flowerdown Park”, with the former officers’ families quarters named “Locking Grove”.
Apart from the ex-military housing, the only buildings that remain today from RAF Locking’s tenure are the Water Tower (no longer in operational use), and the Station Church (now called the Radio Wing Building). But in a further nod to RAF occupancy, some road names have been retained including McRae Road, Post Office Road, Anson Road, and Flowerdown Road. Most of the RAF Single Accommodation blocks were originally named to honour RAF officers who were awarded medals for carrying out acts of extreme gallantry. Those names live on today in the form of Cruikshank Grove, Mottershead Avenue, Cheshire Avenue, Mannock Gardens, and Nicholson Road.
What you see where you stand now
This area and its Commemorative Wall is dedicated to those select Airmen and Airwomen who passed through Royal Air Force Locking, in particular those who were members of Trade Group 3. It is hoped that it will serve as a reminder of this respected key technical training establishment, with many of the tiles illustrating the equipment those airmen and airwomen trained on before going on to serve at units throughout the United Kingdom, Germany, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Singapore, Hong Kong, The Middle East, The Falkland Islands.…indeed anywhere and everywhere that they and the equipment they maintained was required operationally throughout the rest of the world.
We, their former brothers and sisters in arms also remember those friends and colleagues who are no longer with us. There are many names, far too many names to etch on this wall, but we remember them all. Not just at times of national remembrance, but today and every single day. Fly High, and Per Ardua ad Astra - Through Adversity to the Stars.