THE story of two airmen who landed out of the blue in Stinsford in November 1940 captured the attention of two Looking Back readers.

Kay Kearsey of the Stinsford and Bockhampton Village History Group researched the incident while writing The Book of Stinsford.

She said: “The Dorset History Centre has the reports of the chief constable on air raids and crashed aircraft made during the Second World War. The report for this event tells us that at 15.10 on November 15, 1940 a French two-seater monoplane landed in a field at Hull’s Farm, Stinsford. The two Frenchmen were detained, pilot Maurice Halna du Fretay and a passenger, Albert Platz.”

There is some discrepancy between Kay’s account and that of the second reader who got in touch, Neil Matthews, whose father Freddy Matthews met the two fliers as a schoolboy.

Neil explained: “When he had been in an air-raid trench under the beech trees at Dorchester Grammar School, he had seen this strange plane come down. He got on his bike and rode to Stinsford.”

Like Daisy Wyndham Kerr (nee Hull), young Freddy Matthews obtained the fliers’ autographs, a copy of which Neil sent in.

Neil continued: “The autograph that has been suggested as ‘Devreux’ – although it does not look like that in our version – has been annotated in my father’s hand, ‘Czech’. The other signature is annotated ‘French’.”

This second signature, scribbled as it is, does look like it could pass for Maurice Halna du Fretay.

While the first looks more like the name ‘A Devreux’ than A Platz, even Devreux, as Neil points out, might not be an accurate transcription.

Keith Simmons, who sent in a photocopy taken from Daisy Wyndham Kerr’s autograph book for the original story, said: “The signature on the front looks nothing like Albert Platz – it still looks like A Devreux. Is there any chance that the name given in the history centre reports might be incorrect? Was the name written or typed?”

Another divergence in the stories is that, in Kay’s version, both men were French. In Neil’s, ‘Devreux’ is Czech.

But Kay and Neil agree that the plane came from Brittany – Jugon, in fact, about 15 miles west of Dinan.

They were intending to land near Start Point in Plymouth, says Kay, which was directly north of Jugon, but the wind drove them eastwards, they sighted Portland Bill and landed at Stinsford.

Both readers also agree that it was the aim of the airmen to join General de Gaulle’s forces.

“The pilot Maurice Halna du Fretay was 21 years old at the time of the escape from France. He was from a long-established Breton family and while at school in Dinan had visited England twice and Germany once between 1936 and 1937,” said Kay.

“When he was about 18 years old he took flying lessons at Dinan, got his pilot’s licence by 1938 and bought himself a small light aircraft, a Czech Zlin XII.”

(Could this be why Neil’s father scribbled ‘Czech’ in his autograph book?) Halna du Fretay was about to go to university when war was declared and so he became a trainee pilot in the French Air Force, but he was demobilised because of the war.

Kay said: “It was then that he decided to escape from France in his own aeroplane which had been dismantled and hidden at the family’s manor house. The plane was reassembled with the help of friends and took off from the approach road to his parent’s home. His passenger, Albert Platz, is described as a military officer but nothing more has come to light about him.”

This could be because a mistake has been made over ‘Platz’s’ or ‘Devreux’s’ name.

Maurice Halna du Fretay did join General de Gaulle’s Free French Air Force. Having completed a course at 51st Operational Training Unit he joined 607 Squadron in November 1941. In the spring of 1942 he was transferred to 174 Squadron flying Hurricanes, undertaking extremely dangerous tasks, low-level bombing and attacking ships and convoys in occupied France. In August that year the squadron provided air cover for the unsuccessful attack on Dieppe by the Canadians and on August 19 while returning from this operation his Hurricane came down in the sea and he was lost. He was 22 years old.

He was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, having already received the Croix de la Libération for his escape from France.

Kay added: “By chance 174 Squadron were based at Warmwell Airfield for a short while in September 1942, and it’s sad that he wasn’t able to return to the area.”

If you have any more information about what happened on November 15, 1940 or if you know any more about the two airmen, get in touch with Nicola Rayner via the contact details on the page.