Crayford Vickers, RFC Joyce Green and Salmon's Grave

Filming was underway again as CRAY visited the remains of Crayford Vickers factory to film. Matt's group interviewed Simon McKeon from Bexley Archives about Vickers and the impact it had on Crayford. The town hall and Maplin shop were once part of the factory.

Sav's group interviewed Peter in front of the statues of Captain Crayford and Propella. The two statues represent Vickers involvement with World War One and Crayford's involvement in aircraft development. 

Peter talks about the ammunition stores

Next we were headed for Dartford marshes to see the remains of Joyce Green airfield which was once present there. Peter pointed out the ammunition stores which were distinguishable by the ditches they sit in and lack of roof - both features intended to minimise the effect of any accidental explosion. Generally, the site was a poor location for the airfield as it was marshland and made emergency landings of aircraft dangerous.



The children completed their worksheets using the information they had just learnt.

Children complete their workshets

They also got to try the uniform on worn by women who worked in the Vickers factory and explore the remains of the ammunition store.

Then we looked at the old maps of the hangar which were on the airfield and the groups searched for their location. We found the remains below which could possibly have been where the hangar was located.



Done at the marshes, we were then headed to Salmon Road which was named after Wilfred Salmon.

We headed to St Alban's church to view its memorial which featured pilots killed during the War from the area. We spoke to a lady from the church and discovered she had family who worked at Vickers, she agreed to be interviewed and contributed her family's story to the documentary. The children researched some of the pilots on the memorial and found out how they died. They were filmed in front of the memorial reading out the names and their cause of death to remember once again those who were lost in the War.

Finally, we visited Watling Street Cemetry to see the grave of Wilfred Salmon who was buried there after his death at the hands of German Gotha bombers. The children had picked wild flowers whilst at Dartford marshes where Salmon died and placed them on his grave.