'Crash plane hit my house'

He arrived home from work to find his house in Priory Close wrecked.

As we recalled (Memory Lane, March 13), an RAF Chipmunk training plane, which had been carrying out aerobatics over the town, suddenly plunged to earth.

The close, off Priory Road, had six police houses and thanks to the collective efforts of policemen, their wives and nearby workmen, the second pilot, Pilot Officer William Price, was rescued from the burning wreckage.

The captain, Flying Officer Cooper, died in the crash.

Mr Ferris, then 16, had just left Highfield School in the town and had started work as an apprentice carpenter.

He recalls: "I came into Priory Road and found it closed off. I had to tell them who I was so that they would let me through."

He has sent in these two pictures of the fuselage embedded in the house, where he lived with his mum and dad, Mary and Fred.

After the crash, his parents had to move to Chipping Norton and he had to stay with neighbours for three or four months while the house was repaired.

Mr Ferris, who now lives in Leafield, near Witney, tells me: "I think the aircraft was looping the loop over Bicester.

"The wings came off as it went between two houses, then it went straight across the road into our house."

His father, a police sergeant, and two fellow officers were praised for helping to save the second pilot.

Air Commodore DMT MacDonald wrote to Chief Constable James Bailey on behalf of the RAF: "When members of the Oxfordshire Constabulary reached the crash, the aircraft was burning and there was a risk of explosion from the petrol tanks.

"Nevertheless, they and members of their families fought the fire with buckets of water and hoses and succeeded in extricating the second pilot without thought for their own safety.

"Pilot Officer Price might have been burned to death had it not been for their brave and timely action."

Members of 47 Squadron, then based at RAF Abingdon, later presented a plaque to Sgt Ferris "as a token of our esteem".