Erection date: 8/6/2018
At 2.15pm on June 8th 1918, prototype Handley Page V/1500 bomber B9463 crashed at this spot, shortly after taking off from Cricklewood Aerodrome. 5 crew members died in the crash:
Capt. Vernon Busby, RAF
James William Windebank
Robert Cooper
Walter Hathaway
Bertram Cooper
R.I.P
'Till the day break and the shadows flee away.'
The quotation is from the Song of Solomon, either chapter 2:17 or 4:6.
Site: Handley Page V1500 bomber WW1 crash (1 memorial)
NW11, Garrick Avenue, 21
We would like to know how much damage the crash caused to the house. Was it demolished, lightly scathed or untouched? The plaque is laid into the pavement, but that doesn't tell us whether the plane crashed into the pavement, the road, or the house, or all three.
When we visited in 2022 the house and pavement all looked recently renovated, possibly in 2018, when the plaque was installed. The house looks still to have the footprint and overall shape (at the front) that it would have had when built, not long before 1918, but its surface finish (rendering, windows, doors, etc.) are all modern. Google Street View provides no information about what the house looked like before 2018, let alone in 1918.
The aerodrome was only about a mile to the south-west, where the Golder's Green Estate now is.
Credit for this entry to: Alan Patient of plaquesoflondon.co.uk
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