Polebrook is a village in

Northamptonshire Northamptonshire ( ; abbreviated Northants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. It is bordered by Leicestershire, Rutland and Lincolnshire to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshi ...

, England. The population (including Armston) at the 2011 census was 478.

History

There is evidence that Polebrook as a settlement dates back to 400 BC, where the village consisted of many farms. The farms were mainly centred on the modern day village of

Ashton Ashton may refer to: Names *Ashton (given name) * Ashton (surname) Places Australia * Ashton, Elizabeth Bay, a heritage-listed house in Sydney, New South Wales * Ashton, South Australia Canada *Ashton, Ontario New Zealand * Ashton, New Zealan ...

. Polebrook is called ''Pochebroc'' in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book ( ; the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book") is a manuscript record of the Great Survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 at the behest of William the Conqueror. The manuscript was originally known by ...

,Domesday Polebrook
and was the centre of a large administrative area (the Polebrook hundred). There may have been a wooden

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

on the site of the current 12th century stone Church of All Saints.

Thomas de Thelwall Thomas de Thelwall (died 1382 in Ireland, 1382) was an English judge and Crown official who spent part of his career in Ireland, where he held office as Master of the Rolls in Ireland and Clerk to the Privy Council of Ireland. He was Chancellor of ...

Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is a ministerial office in the Government of the United Kingdom. Excluding the prime minister, the chancellor is the highest ranking minister in the Cabinet Office, immediately after the prime minister ...

was the parish priest of Polebrook in the 1360s.

RAF Polebrook Royal Air Force Polebrook or more simply RAF Polebrook is a former Royal Air Force station located east-south-east of Oundle, at Polebrook, Northamptonshire, England. The airfield was built on Rothschild estate land starting in August 1940 ...

was a little southeast of the village during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

from 1941 to 1945. The

USAAF The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

351st Bomber Group was stationed at the

airfield An aerodrome, airfield, or airstrip is a location from which aircraft flight operations take place, regardless of whether they involve air cargo, passengers, or neither, and regardless of whether it is for public or private use. Aerodromes in ...

from 15 April 1943 to 23 June 1945, and the

U.S. flag The national flag of the United States, often referred to as the American flag or the U.S. flag, consists of thirteen horizontal stripes, alternating red and white, with a blue rectangle in the canton bearing fifty small, white, five-point ...

hangs as a memorial to the men, along with a roll of honour in the church. The airfield is now disused, but remains a rich part of Polebrook culture; there is a memorial chapel in Polebrook Church. The base was used as a site for

Thor missile The PGM-17A Thor was the first operative ballistic missile of the United States Air Force (USAF). It was named after the Norse god of thunder. It was deployed in the United Kingdom between 1959 and September 1963 as an intermediate-range ballis ...

s in the 1950s. For some time during the war

Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American actor often referred to as the "King of Cinema of the United States, Hollywood". He appeared in more than 60 Film, motion pictures across a variety of Film genre, genres dur ...

was stationed at Polebrook and at

RAF Marston Moor Royal Air Force Marston Moor or more simply RAF Marston Moor is a former Royal Air Force station located near Tockwith, North Yorkshire, England. It was operational during the Second World War and was originally called RAF Tockwith, but confusio ...

near

Wetherby Wetherby ( ) is a market town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the City of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It is close to West Yorkshire county's border with North Yorkshire and lies approximately from Leeds city centre, from ...

. He made morale-boosting visits locally during his time there, an example being

Marco Marco may refer to: People Given name * Marco (actor) (born 1977), South Korean model and actor Surname * Georg Marco (1863–1923), Romanian chess player of German origin * Jindřich Marco (1921–2000), Czechoslovak photographer and numismat ...

Grantham Grantham () is a market town and civil parish in the South Kesteven district of Lincolnshire, England, situated on the banks of the River Witham and bounded to the west by the A1 road (Great Britain), A1 road. It lies south of Lincoln, England ...

– a picture appears on the Manthorpe News website.

References

External links

* Villages in Northamptonshire North Northamptonshire Civil parishes in Northamptonshire {{Northamptonshire-geo-stub