Another reader with vivid memories of the RAF Beverley crash near Abingdon 50 years ago is Anton Woolloff, of Didcot.

The house where his grandparents, Wilfred and Margaret Stanton, lived, was hit by the stricken transport aircraft.

Mrs Stanton, known as Nelly, was in the house at the time.

She was found unconscious near two of the plane's four engines, which were lying against the smashed wall of the house, and was taken to hospital.

Mr Stanton, known as Dick, is thought to have been at work.

The house had particular significance for Mr Woolloff - he was born there.

As we have recalled, the aircraft - on a flight from RAF Abingdon to Cyprus in March 1957 - turned back shortly after take-off, after suffering engine trouble.

As it flew low, heading for the airfield, one of its wings clipped a group of elm trees, turning it towards a row of terraced homes at Sutton Wick. Seventeen people - 15 RAF personnel and two civilians on the ground - were killed in the crash.

The civilians were Muriel Binnington, who died in her bungalow, and John Matravers, who was there reading the electricity meter at the fateful moment.

Mr Woolloff was eight at the time, and he remembers being taken to see the wreckage later that day or the next day.

He recalls: "It was total devastation. All that was left of Mrs Binnington's bungalow were the hearth stones around the fireplace."

Ironically, his father, Albert Woolloff, was working in a hangar at RAF Abingdon when the Beverley took off.

Mr Woolloff tells me: "He and his colleagues commented that it didn't sound too good'. Within a matter of minutes, it had crashed."

He still has the telegram of sympathy his grandparents received from Airey Neave, MP for North Berkshire, after their ordeal.