Sawbridgeworth and District Rotary Club extends greetings to World War II veterans and their families of the 391st Bombardment Group based on Matching Airfield in Essex and the 834th Aviation Engineer Battalion who built it.

The airfield today has been returned to arable farming. A small memorial pays tribute to those who lost their lives.  A few buildings and roads remain as a reminder of this airfield's vital role.  

This website shows what the village and countryside of Matching is like today. 

If you click on each of the small pictures in gif format below, you will link to a larger and better quality jpeg version of the same picture.   To return to this page, click on 'back'.

These photos are copyright free. Please feel free to copy and use them on other websites. 

The Matching Green village sign made from local oak for the Millennium - note the aeroplane. (Click photo for larger view.)  

Looking across Matching Green in the direction of the road to the airfield

Looking in the opposite direction from the road to the airfield over the Green.

An original airfield road and building. The modern radar aerial is used by an electronics company for research into aerial design. 

This building is labelled 'Bulk store'. The surrounding buildings were taken to nearby North Weald Aerodrome and are in use today for light aircraft, gliders and family airshow events.

Some of the many remaining corrugated iron buildings now used for small industrial units, farming and storage.

The water tower

Part of the extensive network of perimeter roads. Its a great tribute to the 834th Aviation Engineer Battalion that, without maintenance, these roads are still in good working order nearly sixty years later. The battalion began to transform the muddy and barren land towards the end of 1942 into a great airfield, under primitive conditions. In 1944, the same battalion were among those that participated in the D-Day landings on Omaha Beach and built the first landing strip in Normandy, for which they were awarded the Presidential Unit Citation.
(Click here for a link giving details of what they did in France)

The control tower 

The view north west from the control tower - the main landing strip is now arable land.

  The memorial tablet, a permanent reminder of those 391st airmen who made the supreme sacrifice combating the enemy.

Your local contact in Sawbridgeworth and District Rotary Club is NORMAN GRIMES.  To contact him please phone the Rotary Club Secretary on 01279 726108 or email clarkpf@hydehall.demon.co.uk who will forward your mail to him.

We are indebted to Tom Feise and his World War II site on the US 8th & (the Army Air Force in East Anglia for allowing us to reproduce the three pictures below. 

For a full size view and more information CLICK HERE 

LINK to another site with excellent coverage and more photos of Matching Airfield

Return to SAWBRIDGEWORTH ROTARY    Link to further information   Link to matching village website  Link to list of airfields   Link to American Air Museum in Britain  Link to a description of a visit to Matching Green