RAIN, low clouds and rain marred Saturday, September 15, 1956, but still a record total of 1.3 million people in Britain made to the 44 RAF stations' ‘at homes’ events to mark Battle of Britain Day. The figure was an increase of 24,100 on the previous year.
Here and there, however, the weather did manage to interfere with the flying programme. Much of the fly-past at the Bishopbriggs RAF station took place in heavy rain and mist; still, between 7,000 and 8,000 people enjoyed the low-flying display by two Prestwick Pioneers - an “entirely Scottish-designed and -built plane,” noted the Glasgow Herald.
The twin-engined version of the Prestwick Pioneer also made its way to Edinburgh and the RAF station at Turnhouse (above). There, a crowd estimated at 32,000 saw aerobatic and other displays by jet aircraft, including four Hunters from No.43 Squadron, and the Pioneer. Despite being on the “secret list”, a Valiant bomber was among the planes on a static display. It was scheduled to take off and fly past but, probably to the disappointment of several hundred spectators, it remained on the ground.
Further north, at the RAF station at Kinloss, Morayshire, the Scottish Secretary of State, James Stuart, and his wife, Lady Rachel Stuart, joined a crowd of 15,000 spectators at the Battle of Britain anniversary air display there.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here