poppy field

Byfield & District Branch

"Birth of RADAR" Memorial NN7 4SE Litchborough, W. Northants.

Just "down the road" due east of the village, before you get to the A5, let alone the M1, there is a memorial to the proof of concept of one of the most useful pieces of electronics invented before the WWW fifty-years later, RADAR - RAdio Detection And Ranging. AND it was a phenomenon proven to exist in the mid '30's of last century and developed into a major defence against the airborne enemy in the next war against our nation only a few years later.

             

Otherwise known as The Daventry Experiment, because the BBC's Empire Service radio station on nearby Daventry's Borough Hill was a vital part of the day's work, Robert (later Sir Robert) Watson-Watt and Arnold Wilkins (he later got an OBE) proved aircraft could be detected and tracked by radio.

The aircraft used was a Handley Page Heyford bomber, registration K6902 flown by Flight Lieutenant R. S. Blucke.

As an aside, Daventry was also instrumental in the development of Gee, the radio navigation system that guided our bombers home in that same war.

for exact Memorial location see What3Words ///honeybees.stopped.promoting