HAWKESBURY HISTORY
with Michelle Nichols & Jonathan Auld
Serious air crashes
A serious air crash in the Hawkesbury district happened sixty-seven years ago. A Lockheed Neptune( A89-308) aircraft of No 11 Squadron from Richmond RAAF Base was carrying out a routine training exercise when mechanical problems instigated a crash near Bakers Lagoon at Cornwallis killing all eight crew members. This was not the only aviation accident to occur in the Hawkesbury but it was disastrous.
There are strong connections of Australian aviation history to the Hawkesbury. The airfield was established by pilot William Ewart Hart in 1912 at Ham Common, and by 1915 the NSW Training School occupied the site. Land was reclaimed on Ham Common at Clarendon near Richmond and the Aerodrome officially opened in 1916. Over the years some distinguished aviators including Charles Kingsford-Smith, Charles Ulm, and Jean Batten made use of the airfield. The aerodrome at Richmond was established as the first Royal Australian Air Force( RAAF) Base in NSW in 1925.
A notable tragedy occurred in 1929 when a RAAF Moth was circling low over a farm at Cornwallis, when the plane crashed. It struck the farmer, Albert Smith, decapitating him. Smith was also an Alderman on Richmond Council. The
Response from John Alcroft after receiving RAAF correspondence in 1944. pilot Robert Somerville and mechanic Leslie Milgate survived and were pulled from the flames. A twist to the accident was revealed during the inquest that Somerville was engaged to Smith’ s daughter. They married later that year but was tragically killed in 1936 in a plane accident in Victoria.
In 1938 a Bulldog fighter crashed at the Richmond aerodrome, killing the pilot Flying Officer Sutherland who was practicing aerobatic stunts for an Air Show. The following year, there were at least seven aviation accidents in the district. One involved a Avro-Anson bomber which crashed near the Richmond Golf Course,“ during a night reconnaissance flight” with five killed. Following the outbreak of World War II, there was a lot more activity at the RAAF Base and more squadrons based at Richmond. In 1940, two pilots Hamilton and Stewart, were killed when their Lockheed Hudson plane crashed and caught fire about 8km north of the Richmond aerodrome at Freemans Reach.
Early on, it was common to see pilots fly at low levels around the district while undertaking training runs. It was during two of these drills, involving Wirraway aircraft, in 1941 and 1942 respectively, that the community of Sackville Reach witnessed two fatal crashes, that occurred under similar circumstances. Built in 1940, the Wirraway was assigned to No. 22 Squadron in Richmond later that year. While on a training run the aircraft was reported to have been seen flying at a low altitude, bank steeply to the right then hit telephone wires over the Hawkesbury River and crashed into the river bank opposite the Sackville Reach Post Office. PLTOFF Peter Ingoldby was at the controls and crew PLTOFF Terrence McManus acting as safety pilot. Both were dead with eyewitnesses stating that they died instantly.
The second incident occurred ten months later and involved another Wirraway which was assigned to No. 457 Squadron RAAF in 1942. The aircraft hit wires during low level flying near Sackville Reach causing it to crash into the river
Photographic evidence of the Hudson crash, 1944.
on the training exercise. The pilot, FSGT Edwin Bassett, and crewmember, FSGT Allen Blackburn, were both killed as a result of the crash.
Two years later, a devastating accident took place when a Hudson bomber A16- 68 was completing an exercise and failed on its approach to the Base. Just before Christmas 1944, the captain reported technical issues and on their return to Richmond, crashed about 365m from the runway at the Dight Street end.
Several bystanders immediately rushed to the scene to assist, despite the personal risk including John Alcroft, a sixteenyear-old boy from Faithfull Street. Other witnesses who“ endeavoured to extricate trapped occupants” from the flames were FSGT Kessell Paratrooper and Mr Lane from Jersey Street. Despite extraordinary efforts, there were no survivors. All eight RAAF personnel onboard were killed. The two crew members were FLTLT Ron Shore, FLGOFF James Broderick plus ground crew CPL Robert McIlroy, LAC Joseph Gleeson, CPL John Allen, LAC Noel Chamberlain, LAC Francis Smith and twenty-two-yearold ACW Nancy Margaret Ralph, a member of the WAAAF.
It wasn’ t only during conflict, that aviation accidents occurred in the Hawkesbury. Another significant air crash happened in February 1959. The Lockheed Neptune A89-308 of No. 11 Squadron from Richmond RAAF Base was completing a training exercise. Mechanical problems caused by a fire, due to ruptured fuel lines resulted in a fire which burnt through the wing, causing wing failure. The pilot
relayed the emergency to the RAAF and valiantly tried to return to the airfield but the uncontrollable plane crashed to the ground and exploded on the banks of the Hawkesbury River near Bakers Lagoon at Cornwallis killing all eight crew members.
Ted Radford was working as a young apprentice carpenter at the RAAF Base at the time of the accident. In an oral history interview he remembered seeing“ the plane starting to head towards Windsor, trailing smoke” and the pilot was heading for the Base and heard the crash. They went to the site and saw“ literally hundreds of pieces … still smoking”.
Those lost were SQNLDR Geoffrey Ronald Cullen( Pilot), PLTOFF George Ivan Holmes( Co-Pilot), FLTLT Robert Alfred De-Russett-Kydd( Navigator), FSGT John Michael Rock( Navigator), SQNLDR Joseph Kevin McDonald AFC( Signaller), FLGOFF Frederick John Wood( Signaller), PLTOFF Terence Patrick O’ Sullivan( Signaller) and WOFF Vincent Joseph McCarthy( Signaller).
Some of the crew from these fatal crashes are buried in the Richmond War Cemetery located in Dight Street and a photographic record of the Richmond War Cemetery is accessible online at http:// cemetery. hawkesbury. net. au / We hope the Hawkesbury community continues to honour the sacrifice of these men and women and keeps their memory alive.
Accompanying illustrations from the Court of Inquiry- Crash of Hudson A16-68 at Richmond, NSW, 1944. [ Series A705 ] National Archives of Australia www. naa. gov. au
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10 ISSUE 190 // MARCH 2026 theindependentmagazine. com. au THE HAWKESBURY INDEPENDENT