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 Graveley, near Hitchin in Hertfordshire (close to the Cambridgeshire border), is one of the many wartime airfields whose importance lies in support and training rather than long-term headline combat operations. Built during the rapid expansion years, the airfield was positioned to support the wider network of stations around Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire – an area that hosted both RAF training activity and, later, dense USAAF operations.
Wartime flying demanded redundancy. Weather, accidents and operational damage could close a runway unexpectedly, and the RAF learned quickly that it needed multiple alternative landing options within a manageable distance. Smaller airfields like Graveley therefore served as relief landing grounds and satellites, absorbing circuit training, navigation practice and, when required, diversion landings for aircraft that could not safely reach their intended base. This function was particularly valuable in the winter months, when fog and low cloud frequently affected the eastern counties.
Training activity at such stations was repetitive but essential. Crews practised take-offs and landings until they became instinctive, learned to fly standard patterns under blackout conditions, and carried out navigation exercises that built confidence in instrument flying. The airfield community supporting this work included instructors, maintenance personnel and operations staff, alongside WAAF personnel who were central to communications, plotting and administration. The practical aim was to produce reliability: pilots who could land safely at night, navigate accurately, and manage workload under stress.
Graveley’s location also placed it within the orbit of the Allied build-up in 1943-44. Even airfields not used as major combat bases were affected by the scale of the American presence: aircraft movements overhead, visiting detachments, and occasional aircraft repositioning as units trained and prepared for operations. In such an environment, a small airfield’s value as an emergency and overflow site increased, because the airspace and runways of the region were under constant pressure.
- Primary wartime role: satellite and support airfield within the Bedfordshire-Hertfordshire-Cambridgeshire network, used for relief landings and training-related flying.
- Typical activity: circuit training, navigation and instrument practice, diversion landings during poor weather, and short-term support to nearby stations.
- Why it mattered: provided capacity and safer options in a busy operational and training region.
After the war, as flying reduced and temporary buildings were removed, much of Graveley returned to quiet civilian use. Its wartime significance remains as part of the hidden infrastructure of the RAF: a small but useful field that helped keep training output steady and provided the redundancy that made a complex wartime air system more resilient.
Graveley also illustrates how wartime aviation reshaped rural routine. Local roads carried constant military traffic, fields were requisitioned, and night flying changed the character of the landscape under blackout. Even where combat units were not permanently based, the presence of an active airfield brought the war directly into everyday life.
Even without a long list of famous operations, Graveley’s wartime value can be summarised in one word: capacity. In a total war, capacity meant lives. More runway options reduced accident risk, more training slots improved preparedness, and more dispersal choices reduced vulnerability. Graveley contributed to all three.