A MEMORIAL to airmen who died during the Second World War has finally been erected after a 14-year campaign by pensioners to honour the two Australian flyers.
And just days before the memorial was placed on October 14, a £10,000 grant was awarded to complete the garden of remembrance surrounding it.
Project manager Graham Parsons said: “It’s been a real struggle, with lots of problems and issues along the way to resolve, but we are buzzing now, over the moon.”
The memorial and garden of remembrance honours Pilot officers Edward (Ted) Wicky, 22, and his 21-year-old navigator Oswald Mountford of the Royal Air Force, both holders of the Distinguished Flying Medal, who died in the early hours of February 4, 1945, on their way home from a bombing raid over Germany.
Their De Havilland Mosquito plane crashed through Horndean’s parish hall just three miles away from RAF Thorney Island, their home airfield.
Both men died, and the memorial and its garden are at the junction off Five Heads Road and London Road, close to the crash site.
In 2005 a group of pensioners, known as the Horndean Children of the 1940s, began campaigning for the garden of remembrance.
Last week Hampshire County Council contractors Skanska laid the foundations for the memorial that was made by stone masons J Rotherham from Yorkshire.
Mr Parsons added: “The grant from developers’ contributions collected by East Hampshire District Council will mean the garden can be finished.
“The memorial will then be maintained and looked after by Horndean Parish Council.”