Full WW2 control tower details and photos for this wartime airfield are coming soon. Please check back later as this is work progress. If you would like to contribute information or photos please get in touch.
RAF Spilsby, at Great Steeping in Lincolnshire, is an example of a late-war Bomber Command station whose operational life was intense but relatively short. Built in 1942-43 and opened in September 1943, it began as an ‘overflow’ satellite to RAF East Kirkby within No. 5 Group. The original plan to build at nearby Gunby Hall was altered after an appeal to protect the estate, and the airfield was resited – an unusual reminder that wartime construction sometimes collided with local heritage and landowners.
The first operational unit at Spilsby was No. 207 Squadron, which arrived in October 1943 with Avro Lancaster bombers and soon attacked Hanover. The station quickly grew from satellite status into a full bomber station. In April 1944 Spilsby, Strubby and East Kirkby were grouped as 55 Base, with headquarters at East Kirkby, reflecting how bomber stations were organised for administration, servicing and operational support. In October 1944 Spilsby became a two-squadron station when No. 44 (Rhodesia) Squadron moved in from RAF Dunholme Lodge, also operating Lancasters.
Spilsby’s Lancasters flew hundreds of operations across occupied Europe and Germany. For 207 Squadron the operational tally ran into thousands of individual sorties, with heavy losses – an illustration of the relentless casualty rate endured by Bomber Command. The station is also linked to a wider cultural memory of the war through Flying Officer Denys Street of 207 Squadron, one of the men executed after the ‘Great Escape’ from Stalag Luft III in 1944.
The dangers at Spilsby were not limited to enemy action. The station suffered serious accidents, including a fatal explosion in April 1944 when a 1,000-lb bomb detonated during disarming in a fusing shed, killing armourers and damaging buildings. Other incidents included aircraft destroyed on take-off or landing and mid-air collisions in the circuit, events that led to revised approach procedures. Such tragedies reflect the hazardous environment of a busy bomber station where heavy aircraft operated at night and in poor visibility under constant pressure.
As the war ended, Spilsby’s squadrons moved on, including No. 75 (New Zealand) Squadron as plans briefly considered ‘Tiger Force’ against Japan. The airfield then shifted toward armament and gunnery practice before closing and passing into care and maintenance. Today the runways are largely gone, but the station’s history remains an important chapter in Lincolnshire’s bomber landscape – showing how newly built airfields rapidly became operational, generated massive effort, endured heavy loss, and then fell quiet within a few years of opening.
For researchers and visitors, RAF Spilsby can often be understood through the surviving pattern of its runways, perimeter track and dispersal points. Even where buildings have vanished, aerial photographs and ground traces can reveal the technical site, the former station entrance, and the ‘domestic’ camps where personnel lived. These physical clues help connect the local landscape to the wider wartime system of aircrew generation, logistics and operations.