The above photograph was taken in 1923/25 from outside the Methodist Chapel in Coles Lane, looking towards the junction of Croft Lane (seen here coming in from the left) and Coles Lane (which bends around to the right). The Croft Lane cottages in the centre and centre-left were demolished as unfit for human habitation in the late 1930s. The scene is compared to that in 2021 below.

Junction of Croft Lane (coming in from the left) and Coles Lane (bending around to the right) taken from outside the Methodist Chapel in Coles Lane. Left: 1923/25. Ralph Warboys recalled that there was a pond in the trees on the right of the photograph from where he collected water for the pigs at New Close Farm. Right: The scene in 2021, taken from a similar point in Coles Lane.

The Croft Lane cottages in the old photograph are shown in the close-up photographs below.

Coles Lane cottages, demolished 1930s. Mr L. Misson lived in the left hand cottage early in his married life. The people in the right hand photograph are Mr and Mrs Upshaw and their son.

Plane Crash

During the second world war an aeroplane crashed on this site. D. Chapman, who was about 10 years old at the time and living in Coles Lane opposite the crash site recalls that “On Saturday 14 March 1943 at 9pm, a four engine Stirling bomber crashed in front of our house! The exact location was in an L-shaped field which fronted Coles Lane and Croft Lane in Oakington. The field was part grass and part orchard, now houses.” The plane was not from RAF Oakington (whose station log notes that persistent fog at the base meant cancellation of all bombing raids in the period 13–22 March) but instead was Short Stirling N6086 from 1651 Conversion Unit based at Waterbeach. The role of this unit was to convert newly trained pilots onto the aircraft type that they would actually be flying on offensive missions.

D. Chapman recalls that the plane cut through most of the trees in the orchard, and fortunately came to a stop before it reached Coles Lane. It burst into flames, and fire engines from RAF Oakington, RAF Waterbeach, Cottenham and Cambridge were soon on the scene with around 70 firemen in addition to most of the people living in Oakington at the time. All the water was pumped out of a pond behind the Chapmans’ house as well as from the village pond near the crossroads and from another pond where Mead View is now that has since been filled in and built over. Four of the aircrew survived while three trapped in the plane and would have been killed by the inferno if not by the crash itself.

A full article on the crash appears in the November 2018 edition of the Village Journal.

Later on, Mrs Brickwood’s post office was built on the site.

If you have any information or photos of these Croft Lane cottages, please leave a comment below.

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