Nigger's grave (Merged)
 

I happened to be at Scampton yesterday. I went by Nigger's grave in front of the old 617 hangar. I was surprised to see that the inscribed plate with Nigger's details was missing, leaving just the rough slab. Does anyone know what has happened to it? Is it being cleaned, or is there something more sinister?

Laurence

I suspect the PC mafia have had it removed. :ugh:

Which 617 Hangar? The one they were using during the Vulcan days or the one they were using at the time of the Dams raid? During the 50th anniversary celebrations in 1968, Barnes Wallis surprised everyone - 'cos he knew the right one...

Hello brakedwell. Trust you are well!
I can't believe it! I hope you are not right.

For Blacksheep: the hangar in front of which Nigger's grave stands. I understood it was the Guy Gibson hangar.

Laurence

Nigger was hated by the airmen. I'd heard that on his demise, he was actually taken to a nearby ditch and unceremoniously 'disposed of', with added yellow liquid poured on him from a height! Is that a fable?

It was certainly outside the third hanger from the west (whichever sqn's that was once, but was the Bulldog Sqn when I was there) on the waterfront in the early 90's. it was a plain white painted stone with the offending canine's name chiselled into it.

Stop me if I'm boring you again with the story, but the Kenyan student on our course looked at it and commented the penalty for failing a course in the RAF seemed a bit severe!

I'm not convinced that was the real grave Dan. Sounds to me like it was moved/desecrated/etc more than once, and no-one remembers where the original is. I think the one you and I saw at Scampton was merely 'window dressing'.

I'm sure that it was nowhere near hangers when I saw it in the early 1950s.

Nigger's grave was moved when the station was rebuilt for its role as a V-bomber base.

Incidentally, I have it on good authority that neither dog nor master were terribly popular at sunny Scampton.......

But maybe that's what wartime leadership required.

Story goes that both aircrew and goundcrew relieved themselves on Nigger's grave after a night on the toot.
As I recall, it was on the left as you came out of the 617 (Vulcan) hangar side doors leading to the airfield.

Barnes Wallace disappeared during the 50th anniversary celebrations and was found chatting with the troops in the second hangar down from the north end of the row. He said that was where 617 were located when they were preparing for the Dams raid. The "grave" was marked outside the last hangar, at the SW end of the row. Take your pick.

Heard the same too from an old radio queen (or was he avionics fairy? :confused:) who was based there.

Don't know if it was genuine resentment or just "tradition". :suspect:

It all seems a bit mysterious. I was assured by someone with whom I saw the grave last Sunday that the original plaque was there until recently. It is suuroiunded by a tall, strong wrought iron fence, and there were still lots of Remembrance poppies in place from last November. This site shows the plaque that was there:

RAF Scampton - Museum Gallery

Strange.

Laurence

Scampton.
 

During 1969 I worked as an agricultural labourer at Scampton whilst I waited for my application to be processed to join ATC and start controller training.
Most of my time was spent driving a tractor towing gang mowers cutting the grass on the airfield. I did have another job though. Below is an excerpt from part of an artical I wrote several years ago now.


One of my tasks was the upkeep of Niggers grave. Nigger was the Black Labrador pet dog belonging to Wing Commander Guy Gibson, Commander of 617 Squadron. On the night of 16th May 1943, Nigger was killed by a car when he strayed beyond the camp boundaries just as 617 Squadron crews were preparing for the raids on the Ruhr Dams. Gibson was devastated. Not only had Nigger been a friend, he had also been the squadrons mascot. He asked that Nigger be buried in a plot of land outside 617 Squadron hangers. There he remains to this day. He has a small rectangular plot with a marble headstone. I would make sure that the grass was always neat and whenever possible flowers were in abundance. A local story that has been circulating for many years is that Nigger was never buried there at all. The airman tasked by Charles Whitworth, the station commander, to arrange the burial sold Nigger to the local nackers yard. Whether this is true or just urban myth, who knows.


Clint.

Very droll!! :ok:

Did Nigger die? If you look closely at the film "The Dambusters", near the end when Gibson is talking to Barnes-Wallace, a black dog crosses the field behind them. All who worked on the film swore there was no dog on the airfield at the time. Spooky

I was on 617 at Scampton in the early 60s and our hangar was 2 hangar. Second from the right if viewed from the airfield side. I always understood it had traditionally been 617's since first allocated in 1943 - even on their return from other wartime placements (Coningsby, Woodhall Spa etc.).

Gibson's office had been upstairs on the left as you looked at the side of the hangar. The CO still occupied that office in my day. As a lowly J/T I never got to see inside that Holy of Holies but the orderly room clerk swore the dog's scratch marks were still on the inside of the door.

In font of said offices was a narrow road into the hangar that led down from the original peri-track. The peri-track had been moved out into the grassland and concreted to accomodate the V Bombers when the base was developed in the 50's. The old peri-track was used as a carpark. Walking from the hangar to the peri, the dog's grave was on the left about 3 yards from the end. It was covered with a white granite (might have been marble) slab that gave the dog's name, Gibson as his owner and the date it was killed - pointing out it was the eve of the raid.

The squadron dispersal was E dispersal - immediately in front of and across the peri-track from the hangar. Going from the dispersal to the Airmens Mess for duty supper or the Naafi for last orders, one took a bee-line across the front of the hangar into the domestic site - straight past the grave. Returning was, of course, likewise. I have to admit that your correspondent did, often, witness certain airmen take a piddle on the grave as a matter of ritual. Naturally, I, as a refined member of the Avionics department, never resorted to such behaviour - we left that sort of thing to the riggers, plumbers and such like.

As it happened we had an engine fitter Ch/Tech who had served on 617 during the war - but not at the time of the Dams Raid. He categorically insisted that it was common knowledge when he was first on the squadron that, in fact, the dog had been left in the guardroom yard when it was killed and that night F/Sgt Powell detailed 2 airmen to go and get it and bury it. They took it over the road in front of the camp gates and buried it in the spinney. They then realised chiefy might want to see the plot so they scampered up to the hanger, scraped of some turf and churned up a couple of inches of earth.

For the really gullible, there is actually a book about haunted airfields in Lincolnshire and it claims that the ghost of Nigger has often been seen around Scampton - I must admit I'd never heard that story on either of my tours at the base. - But I was once trapped in a Vulcan while an escaped police dog was wandering around loose on the pan - stupid bloody dog-handlers!

So, when 617's aircrew were busily flying their exceptionally dangerous mission over Germany, a couple of lazy erks couldn't even be trusted to bury a dog......:hmm:

Did they even 'bury' him in the spinney - or just hide him in a thicket?

Well, we are finding out some things about poor Nigger and his grave.
I thought you might like to see what the "grave" looked like last Sunday. First the steel fence around the grave (real one or faked) which is just in front of the 617 hangar, which sounds like the site that Erk described:

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/c...x/DSCF0028.jpg

Then the site of the missing plaque:

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/c...x/DSCF0025.jpg

Laurence

But as you say, someone for whatever reason has chipped off his name from the memorial.
I know there was some suggestion by the PC brigade about 10 years ago that this should be done on the usual grounds that it MIGHT cause offence, but I never thought it would ever actuially happen.