RAF Sutton Bridge began for a simple, practical reason: gunnery. The flat ground beside the Nene Outfall Cut was close to the ranges around The Wash, and that geography dictated the station’s character for the next two decades.
A Wash-side practice ground (1926 to 1939)
The site was first used in 1926 as a rudimentary grass landing ground for squadrons visiting the nearby weapons ranges, often during summer periods. It was developed during the early 1930s, but its purpose stayed much the same. Sutton Bridge existed to support range work, armament practice and the steady business of teaching aircrew to hit what they aimed at.
Fighter Command interlude (late 1939 to early 1940)
With war declared, Sutton Bridge was pulled into the wider reshaping of Fighter Command. In October 1939 new squadrons reformed there, including 264 and 266. For both, Sutton Bridge was more a stepping-stone than a long-term home, a convenient place to stand up units as aircraft and personnel arrived, before they moved on to operational stations.
The OTU years: making fighter pilots (1940 to March 1942)
From March 1940 the station became closely associated with operational training. No. 6 Operational Training Unit formed at Sutton Bridge and was renumbered No. 56 OTU later in 1940. Hurricanes were central to the work, with other types used for parts of the syllabus.
This phase mattered because it fed front-line squadrons at a time when speed was everything. Training units like this were busy, pressured places. The flying was demanding, the weather could be rough, and accidents were an accepted and grim accompaniment to the output the RAF needed.
Sutton Bridge also became familiar to foreign pilots serving with the RAF, including men from occupied Europe. They passed through in numbers, learning RAF procedures and working up to operational standards before joining squadrons elsewhere.
Central Gunnery School (April 1942 to February 1944)
Sutton Bridge’s defining wartime role came next. From April 1942 it became the home of the Central Gunnery School. The aim was not basic instruction but advanced gunnery training, producing gunnery leaders and instructors who could raise standards across the RAF.
In practice, this meant structured teaching of air-to-air shooting, deflection, harmonisation and the methods instructors would take back to other units. Having fighter and bomber elements in the same place allowed realistic exercises: fighters could practise on towed targets and in controlled attacks, while bomber crews and gunners trained within a system that treated gunnery as a discipline rather than a hopeful afterthought. Spitfires and Wellingtons were among the types commonly associated with the school’s work there.
Training support and the quiet end of wartime flying (1944 to 1946)
When the Central Gunnery School moved on, Sutton Bridge continued as a useful airfield rather than a headline one. From early 1944 it served as a satellite for a service flying training school based at Peterborough, with training aircraft using the field until April 1946.
After the war: retained and repurposed (late 1940s to 1958 and beyond)
Flying finished, but Sutton Bridge did not close immediately. It was retained for years, and parts of the site were used for maintenance-related work during the 1950s, including salvage and engine servicing activity. By 1958 the RAF presence had ended.
Much of the station area has since returned to agricultural and commercial use, but Sutton Bridge is still remembered locally. Its memorial, dedicated to all nationalities who served, is a fair summary of what the station really was: a training and gunnery workplace that handled a steady flow of people, aircraft and hard-won lessons.