Biggin Hill - BoB Pilots' Pub
 

Help please! Can anybody help my grey matter recall the name of the pub visited during OASC selection at Biggin Hill (late 60s). I recall it was fairly close to the airfield and it had a blackboard or something with the signatures/autographs of all the BoB pilots stationed there in 1940 (and who drank in the pub).

Names on a postcard please to:

Fg Off Bloggs:sad:

The Whiteheart?

The White Hart at Brasted.

Don't bother though - it's now an utterly charmless, soulless and sterile 'stylishly refurbished' gastropub lacking in any atmosphere or links to its former history.

One reviewer wrote

Many thanks, Chaps!:D

Bloggs

Close NickB - but no cigar!

It is/was the White Hart at Brasted. It has been "modernised" :yuk: and sadly the blackboard with signatures is no longer there. :(

The good news is that I believe the Blackboard to be alive and well at the nearby Shoreham Aircraft Museum which has lots of other B of B stuff. :ok:

[Beaten to it by BEags!]

Shocking historical vandalism. I don't recollect going there - which could be an oxymoron.

Even the new :yuk: Tommy Ducks in Manchester kept a couple of pairs of knickers as a nod to history.

Glad to read that the board was preserved, so less shocking :ok:

Some good news re pub memorabilia. The Belle, formerly the Peartree, in Bassingbourn village closed down but was re-opened by some local businessmen. Fortunately they preserved the pictures etc from the time the Americans were at Bassingbourn and the making of 'The Memphis Belle' hence it's new name.

I visited the White Hart perhaps 10 years ago and a replica of the signed blackout board still hung on the wall then. Otherwise it was pretty much as BEagle describes.

Around the same time I went to the Jackdaw at Denton, between Canterbury and Folkestone, famed for a cameo role with Ms York in "The Battle of Britain". A much nicer pub with good food as I recall.

ISTR a pub nearby that was frequented in the late 60s by bikers at the weekends. Was that the White Hart?

Just had a look at some dire reviews on the place and it seems to be one of those eateries that require you to order your food and pay for it before eating, along with setting your own table. Never a good sign.

There is another pub which was frequented by Biggin's BoB pilots, much nearer to the airfield, which lacks a blackboard and is not so famous - The Old Jail on Jail Lane. Last time I went (c 5 years ago) it was still a lovely country pub. Can't remember how much memorabilia they have though.

A very many years ago, I went to the White Hart whilst on a Flying Scholarship at "Biggin on the Bump" ... I can assure you the significance of the situation was not lost on this callow youth while I sipped my ... ahem, lemonade and gazed at the black-out board.

Perhaps the Blue Oyster.....:ooh: ??

I think the blackout screen is now at Shoreham

The Shoreham Aircraft Museum

Let us now praise Famous Men.
 

I remember seeing a picture of the Blackboard: one of the signatures on it was Paul Ritchey (later the Wing Commander who sailed with us in the "Stirling Castle " out to Bombay), so adding colour to the fairy-tale we had been told about a new Spitfire Wing to be formed in India. The idea was that we were going to cover ourselves with glory in a coming "Battle of India".

Of course it never happened, there were no Spitfires out there then :suspect:; it was one of the many "pups" sold us in those times (but it kept us happy for a while).

D.

The Eagle in Cambridge is well worth a visit. The RAF bar at the rear has lots to keep you there - history at it's best. Don't forget to look up at the ceiling.


TN.

The Blue Bell at Tattershall Thorpe has its original decor and signatures on the ceiling. Totally unmodernised despite several changes of ownership.

small pic
 

Thanks, spooky3, just a bit too small and not enough pixels to expand it either! Anybody know of a larger one?

Bloggs:8

PS. Bloody hell! A Google of 'White Hart Battle of Britain blackboard' brought up an image of Kiera Knightley's right nipple! How does that work?

Just as an aside, Great Massingham WWII airfield in Norfolk is still landable on the original runway. There is an excellent pub in the village called the Dabbling Duck. I doubt the village has changed at all since the war. The church still has original 14C pews in it. Well worth a visit, it's in Pooleys.

Bloggs- nice tip (with a 'p') I tried that and saw the same images- which direct you to Pprune.org! Others have been down this path.

I did OASC Biggin Hill just before BofB Sunday, 1969. I asked around as to the pub where the remaining 'few' gathered on the 15th, duly travelled down by train early on the evening- and saw- a vast number of bikers and no-one that remotely resembled anyone I expected to see! I always thought I went to the wrong place. Now this thread tells me I got it right, and I'm not the only one who saw bikers.