Date:	Sunday 8 March 1942
Time:	10:35 LT
Type:	Supermarine Spitfire Mk I
Owner/operator:	53 OTU RAF
Registration:	L1014
MSN:	227
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 1 / Occupants: 1
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Ysgyryd Fawr (Skirrid) (Holy Mountain), 2.5 miles NNE of Abergavenny -   United Kingdom
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Llandow, Glamorgan
Destination airport:

Narrative:
This Spitfire was assigned to 53 Operational Training Unit (OTU) at RAF Llandow. On 3rd March 1942, the aircraft, being flown by Sgt Thomas Crowe, was seen to dive out of cloud in a spin and then spun in the opposite direction before hitting the ground at Foxes Bark Farm, Ysgyryd Fawr (Skirrid) aka. Holy Mountain, 2.5 miles north-north east of Abergavenny, Monmouthshire. The pilot was killed.


The name ‘Skirrid’ is derived from the Welsh ‘Ysgyryd’, which means to shake or tremble. It’s easy to see where this name came from, with the massive landslide on the hill’s northern tip. The Skirrid is still prone to small mud flows and landslides today. The word ‘fawr’ translates as big or large.

The Skirrid is also known locally as ‘the Holy Mountain’. This may have come from two sources. The first is the now-ruined chapel of St Michael’s right on the summit, which was used by Roman Catholics after the Reformation.

The second is the legend which tells how the dramatic landslide on the north of the mountain was caused by an earthquake or lightning strike the moment Christ was crucified.

L1014 first flew on the 12th of June 1939 and was the 225th aircraft off the assembly at Eastleigh. She went to 610 Sqn’ on the 4th of October 1939 after a long period in storage at No15 MU. The squadron was formed on 10 February 1936 at Hooton Park, Cheshire as one of s Auxiliary Squadrons. It was equipped with the Hawker Hart light bombers. As war approached, these were replaced by Hawker Hinds in May 1938. On 1 January 1939 the squadron role was changed into that of a fighter squadron, and on the outbreak of war in September 1939 it received its first Hawker Hurricane fighters. By the end of that same month, it was flying the more advanced Supermarine Spitfire.
On the 3rd of October the squadron received orders to move to RAF Wittering by the 10th of the month. They had received their new Spitfires bar one that was left U/S at RAF St Athan, of these was L1014, she was given the radio codes ‘DW-G’.
The records kept by the early Raf squadrons were extremely rigid and 610 was not the exception even down to three regular aircraft being used for patrol duties and flown by different pilots to get used to the procedure, the other aircraft were flying but in the training roll such as formation flying to the stringent taste of the CO. As you read the records you will see the visual change in the flying as the drums of war becoming louder! L1014 is listed as on an active patrol on the 19th of January 1940 as a flight of three aircraft, with F/O P.G. Lamb at the controls, their tasking was convoy patrol. The same three Spitfires were scrambled on the 20th and ordered to patrol Wells at Angels 5 (5,000 feet), to identify a single aircraft. They intercepted six Wellingtons with no E/A sighted. L1014 was listed as having FAAC (Flying Accident Category C) on the 16th of April. The reason and who was involved is completely unknown and probably never will be! Because within the squadron records between March and May there is a blank page but with the words;
“APRIL 1940
A record was not rendered for this month”

She was sent for repair and then posted to 92 squadron on the 14th of September who had just returned to RAF Biggin Hill from Pembrey. She was flown on the 16th by Sgt Folkes to patrol Hawkinge, he flew L1014 on a number of occasions before she was withdrawn for routine maintenance. On the 28th and the 29th she was flown on an air test by a Sgt Ellis, after this the squadron records became very vague and the aircraft registrations were not quoited due to the increase of enemy activity and the squadron were in the thick of it, L1014 was exchanged for the MkII and posted from front line flying and going to 7 OTU on the 1st of November and 58 OTU
On the 7th of June 1941, before finally coming to 53 OTU on the 14th of September 1941.
On the 26th of September 1941 she was under the control of a qualified Australian pilot P/O Whillan, he was a Blenheim pilot and was being converted to the Spitfire. He was over the Gower Penninsular when he found himself lost due to bad weather, he was fortunate to have been between the area of Whiteford point and Worms Head when he began to run out of fuel. He saw the long expanse of sand of Whiteford sands and with the tide out, he was able to make a successful forced wheels down landing with no damage to him or his mount. Not far, on the other side of the dunes was a secret ‘Decoy Site’ and the crew who were RAF saw him land and they were able to push the Spitfire off the high-water mark. The following day fuel arrived from Pembrey and he was able to take off, returning to Llandow.

On the 3rd of March 1942, L1014 was being flown by Sgt Crowe also a serving airman with 113 Sqn’ (operating the Bristol Blenheim and spend most of the war overseas in North Africa). It is not known if he was a pilot converting to the Spitfire. However, he was on a navigation exercise over the mountains and onto the borders when it was seen to dive out of cloud in a spin and then an opposite spin in the opposite direction. It is thought the Spitfire was under control and trying to pull out of the dive she flew into the trees before hitting the ground behind at Foxes Bark Farm in a south-westerly direction scattering wreckage in the trees and the engine ending up outside the wood, in a field behind the farmhouse, northeast of Abergavenny, killing the pilot.

Crew:
Sgt Thomas Alfred Reginald Crowe 24yo 527339 RAF. Pilot. killed.

Buried:
Wallasey (Rake Lane) Cemetery. Section 20C. Grave 532.

Wreckage:
Extremely difficult site to find with the growth of the trees and the fall of needles over the passing 80 years. Also, the proximity to the farm tracks made the recovery an easy one. Wreckage was found and put on display by the Air Cadets at Abergavenny (the small museum now closed).

Memorials:
A small plaque to the pilot can be seen at the pub at Pantygelli.
CWGC Headstone.

Additional Information:

Sgt Crowe is listed as 113 Squadron on the CWGC records, which gives further argument that he was a serving pilot and after completion of the conversion course was to be returned to 113 as at the time, they were due to deploy to Burma as a ground attack role, their mount at the time was believed to be the MkV Spitfire. The squadron were to receive the MkIIC Hurricane the later the American P47 Thunderbolt.

Sgt Ronald Henry Fokes, of Hillingdon, Middlesex, was born on the 5th of December 1912 and joined the RAFVR in April 1937 as an Airman u/t Pilot. He was called up on the 1st of September 1939, then on the 15th of January 1940 he joined 92 Squadron at Croydon. Over Dunkirk on the 2nd of June 1940, Fokes claimed a He111 destroyed and possibly two more and on the 4th of July he shared in the destruction of another.
Fokes shared a Do17 on the 10th of September and damaged another on the 15th, probably destroyed a Ju88 on the 24th, probably destroyed a Me109 on the 30th, destroyed a He111 and two Me109's on the 15th, destroyed a Me109 on the 26th, shared a Ju88 on 9th November, destroyed another Me109 on the 15th and got a probable Me109 on the 17th.
Awarded the DFM (gazetted 15th November 1940), Fokes was commissioned in late November. He destroyed Me109's on 5th and 12th December, damaged a Do17 on 23rd January 1941, shared a Ju87 on 5th February and destroyed a Me109 on 26th April. Fokes was posted to 53 OTU, Heston on 1st May 1941 as an instructor. He went to CFS Upavon for a course on 4th August after which he returned to Heston on the 24th, this time to 61 OTU.
Flying in Typhoon MN372 ‘FM-A’ on the 12th of June 1944, Fokes was hit by flak while strafing enemy vehicles at low level about 16 miles south of Caen. He baled out but was too low for his parachute to deploy fully and he was killed. Initially buried at the village of Soulangy, he was moved to the war cemetery established at Banneville-la-Campagne in 1945.
Sgt Peter Gilbert Lamb was born on 16th June 1914. He joined 610 Squadron, Auxiliary Air Force in early 1938 and was called to full-time service with the squadron in late October 1939. On the 3rd of July 1940 he shared a Do17, on the 24th of August and the 26th, he claimed Me109's destroyed, on the 29th a Me110 and on the 30th a He111. Lamb was posted away from the squadron on 28th October 1940. He was awarded the AFC (gazetted 26th October 1943) and released from the RAF in 1945 as a Squadron Leader.
In June 1946 he began to reform 610 Squadron at Hooton Park, having been disbanded on 3rd March 1945. Lamb commanded the squadron from 31st July 1946 to March 1950.
Lamb died in December 1969 in Romsey, Hants.


Pilot: Sgt Thomas Alfred Reginald CROWE RAF, Service Number 527339, aged 24) - killed. Buried Wallasey (Rake Lane) Cemetery, Wallasey, Cheshire.
R.I.P.

1. Brecon Beacons National Park, 1995, Identification Guide Aircraft Crashes in the National Park, ID 27
2. Doylerush, E, 2008, Rocks in the Cloud: High-Ground Aircraft Crashes in South Wales, p. 108
3. Halley, J J, 1979, Royal Air Force Aircraft L1000 to L9999, p.5.
4. https://www.coflein.gov.uk/en/site/507053/details/supermarine-spitfire-l1014
5. http://www.ggat.org.uk/timeline/pdf/Military%20Aircraft%20Crash%20Sites%20in%20Southeast%20Wales.pdf
6. https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2736261/crowe,-thomas-alfred-reginald/
7. https://www.iwm.org.uk/memorials/item/memorial/51614
8. http://www.rafcommands.com/forum/showthread.php?11588-More-53-OTU-PROBLEM-SPITFIRES
9. http://tr4ce.co.uk/aircrash/?page_id=226
www.bbm.org.uk
discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk
aircrewremembered.com
www.nationaltrust.com

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