On 29th November 1942 this aircraft was one of two belonging to 4 Squadron that took off from Clifton airfield near York at around 10.20hrs for a non-operational photographic flight that would see them fly out over to Douglas, Isle of Man using Fleetwood as a turning point on both outbound and inbound routes. The pilots were instructed to take a photograph of Douglas and return to base. They headed west across the Pennines and in poor weather and visibility the aircraft became seperated. Mustang AP208 flew into cloud-covered moorland on the lower slopes of Hawthornthwaite Fell Top in the Forest of Bowland at around 10.40hrs onto an area of ground known as Holdron Moss. The aircraft broke up sadly killing the pilot. The second aircraft lost contact and because of poor weather returned to base. He and the commanding officer of B-Flight, 4 Squadron then took off in the squadron's Tiger Moth and located the crashed Mustang later in the day. A full account of this incident is to be found in Nick Wotherspoon's book "North-West Aircraft Wrecks". I do not wish to copy his work.
Mustang AP208 was built to British Purchasing Corporation contract A-1493 by The North American Aircraft Corporation at Inglewood / Dallas, USA and was transported by sea to the UK, arriving at Liverpool Docks in July 1942. From there it was transported by road to No.1 AAU at Speke where it arrived on 10th August 1942. After assembly and testing it was taken on charge by 4 Squadron on 6th September 1942 and based at Clifton. As a result of the crash on 29th November 1942 the damage was assessed as being Cat.E2/FA and it was struck off charge.
Pilot - F/O Sholto Paton Marlatt RCAF (J/5971), aged 29, of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Buried Lytham St.Anne's (Park) Cemetery, Lancashire (D/Non-con/731).
Sholto 'Hob' Marlatt was born on 9th August 1913 at Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and was the son of Dr.Charles Reid and Mary Sybil (nee Paton) Martatt. He married Vera Cox in March 1939 and the couple had a baby son in 1941. He worked as an accountant in Vancouver prior to enlisting there on 24th October 1940. After training he was awarded his pilot's flying badge and also a commission on 4th July 1941. Having arrived in the UK later in the year he trained at 41 OTU before posting to 4 Squadron.
I visited the site on an atrocious day with Alan Hudson, Eric Barton, Ken Reast and my wife. We located some big sections of the aircraft in reasonably deep heather but did not remain on the site long because of the poor weather. Photographs were difficult.
A portion of armour plate is perhaps the heaviest item still left at the crash site.
Two peices located which show the Mustang "73" prefix to the part number and the lower photograph shows an "NAA" North American Aircraft inspection stamp
Eric Barton, Alan Hudson and Ken Reast with me on a very wet day at the crash site.