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Tangmere — a wartime airfield and the departure of three teams

Story period: Airfield from 1918 · ANTHROPOID departed 28 December 1941 · RAF use until 1970

Location: former RAF Tangmere airfield, West Sussex

Tangmere in southern England was an important wartime fighter base and an airfield for clandestine flights. On 28 December 1941 an aircraft of RAF No. 138 Squadron took off with ANTHROPOID, SILVER A and SILVER B aboard. The flight to occupied Czechoslovakia connected British air support with the Czechoslovak operation. Gabčík and Kubiš landed near Nehvizdy rather than the planned Plzeň area.

From training airfield to combat base

1918–1940

Tangmere began during the First World War and expanded again between the wars.

The airfield was used for training towards the end of the First World War. After a brief closure, it reopened as RAF Tangmere in 1926. It expanded during the 1930s, served fighter units in the Battle of Britain and suffered heavy damage in a German raid on 16 August 1940.

An airfield for secret operations

1941–1945

Different kinds of missions left Tangmere for occupied Europe.

Historic England documents secret SOE flights from Tangmere to occupied France. For ANTHROPOID, the airfield was the departure point for RAF No. 138 Squadron’s flight. SOE, Czechoslovak military intelligence and the RAF performed different tasks: training and equipment, operational planning and air transport respectively.

Three teams in one aircraft

28 December 1941

Seven soldiers travelled from Bellasis to the airfield with their equipment.

ANTHROPOID, SILVER A and SILVER B arrived from the Bellasis holding station. On the evening of 28 December, seven Czechoslovak soldiers boarded a Halifax of No. 138 Squadron. A long night flight over occupied territory followed, its success dependent in part on weather and navigation.

Landing outside the intended area

29 December 1941

ANTHROPOID landed near Nehvizdy, east of Prague.

A navigation error brought Gabčík and Kubiš to Nehvizdy instead of the planned area near Plzeň. The landing changed their first movements in the Protectorate, but not the operation’s objective.

Tangmere after ANTHROPOID’s departure

1944–1982

The surviving control tower was built later.

The surviving control tower was built in 1944 to replace an earlier structure destroyed in an air raid. After the war, Tangmere also supported RAF speed-record flights. The base closed in 1970 and an aviation museum opened here in 1982. The reference point beside the tower therefore does not mark the building that controlled the December 1941 departure.

This story represents the former RAF Tangmere grounds as a whole. The reference point at 50.85000, −0.70730 lies near the surviving control tower within the historical airfield. It does not identify a stand, building or the precise point from which the Halifax departed on 28 December 1941.

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