A REMARKABLE collection of medals, photographs and memorabilia belonging to a husband and wife who were both stationed at RAF Pembroke Dock in wartime has been donated to the town’s Heritage Centre.

Leeds-based brothers John and Paul Newton and their wives made special trips to Pembrokeshire to hand over the collection of their uncle and aunt, Bill and Freda Carter. Bill Carter was a wireless operator/air gunner with 228 Squadron RAF flying in Sunderlands on operational patrols while Edna was in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. For a time they were stationed together at ‘PD’.

The collection includes Bill’s flying logbook, which lists many flights during the Battle of the Atlantic and the war against the U-boats, his campaign medals and the Legion d’Honneur, a rare award presented to him by the French Government in recent years.

“Uncle Bill was very proud of the medals and of his service on the Sunderland flying boats and he and his wife enjoyed attending flying boat reunions at Pembroke Dock in recent years,” recalled John Newton. “The family feel it is most appropriate that the collection come to Pembroke Dock.”

Receiving the collection on behalf of the Heritage Centre was John Evans, Patron of the Sunderland Trust, who added: “I had the pleasure of meeting Bill and Edna at Pembroke Dock Reunions during which Bill met up with several members of the Sunderland crew whom he flew with from ‘PD’. Those were special times.”