page_title: Besselsleigh
section_title: Air crash
hierarchical_section_title: Besselsleigh / Air crash
caption_attribution_description: A Royal Air Force Armstrong Whitworth Whitley Mk.V bomber (serial T4131) from No. 78 Squadron (code EY-W) in flight, circa 1940.
context_page_description: Besselsleigh or Bessels Leigh is a village and civil parish about 4 ¹⁄₂ miles south-west of Oxford. Besselsleigh was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred it to Oxfordshire.
  The village is just off the A420 road between Oxford and Swindon.
context_section_description: On March 14, 1944 an Armstrong Whitworth Whitley V bomber aircraft, T4337 from No. 10 Operational Training Unit RAF at Abingdon, was on circuits and landings practice when its Royal Canadian Air Force pilot lost control while changing from flare path to instruments. The aircraft crashed onto what was then a military firing range at Great Park Farm, Besselsleigh and almost immediately burst into flames. All three members of its crew were killed.
  At the time United States Army soldiers were billeted at Besselsleigh Park. They and a local man, Ron Amey, tried without success to rescue the crew. The pilot, Sgt DC Adamson, is buried in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission section of Botley Cemetery, on the outskirts of Oxford. Ron Amey went on to succeed his father William Amey as head of the Amey quarrying and construction company.
caption: Armstrong Whitworth Whitley V aircraft similar to T4337 which crashed at Great Park Farm
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