Does anyone know the story about a (supposedly) German plane coming down in the Meadows, inbetween Todwick & Kiveton ? The tale was told once or twice to me when I was a kid, by an uncle who insisted that he was one of the first on the scene of the crash. As I recall, he witnessed all the gory details (including, so the story goes, a headless pilot, who then went on to haunt the place).

The story just came back to me as I read a thread on the ghost(s) of Packman Lane, and I wondered how much truth there was in it.

Anyone else know anything about it ?

I lived in Todwick from 1963 for a long time....Have no say that I never heard this story.
The Packman Lane (nearer Thorpe Salvin) ghost is supposedly a Roman centurion, the Lane being part of a Roman Road....

I don't think it was actually on the Meadows but pretty close. Near the old Todwick sewage works.

When a new sewer was put in, some society was given permission to dig on the site where the plane came down. I don't know what they found. They were only given a limited amount of time.

Funnily enough the wood nearby is locally know as ghost wood

So is the ghost in Ghost Wood the pilot maybe ?

It could be, I doubt it can be a coincidence.

i think you will find that it was a raf plane that crashed,my mum has a news paper cutting been round for it tonight she is going to find it out and i will post all the details on here for you,could you please tell me where ghost wood is have lived in the area all my life and never heard of it

Ghost Wood is off the bridleway asccross the Meadows. It's 1 field away from the track.

If you go from Todwick to Kiveton it is off to the right. It belongs to Leathers' at Low Laithe Farm.

thanks for clearing that up only live at the bottom of the meadows near the school walk my dog up there never knew it was called ghost wood

:suspect: is this where that cave is ? ;) nice seeing you at Packman lane nearenuff:P

There's a cave in Anston Stones Wood, overlooking the railway track.
Is that your cave ya meaning about, Jon? :confused:

hi jon
no the cave is in the quarry as you turn into the station pub car park go into the quarry follow the track dont turn into the brick works keep looking to the left where the factory endsyou will see a cave half way along the cliff face.or as you go out of kiveto towards the station there is a field and layby on left hand side park up go to the end of the playing field and on your right there is a gap in the fence which leads into the quarry cave on the right hand side.
in the early seventies this got a load of press coverage as being a bit strange,noises ect i even think the local tv crew turned up to have a look i am sure there will be more people on here with some info about it.
but for real ghost hunting i am surprised no one has said anything about jasper the ghost that haunts the saxon pub,he is a monk that walks from the old keeton hall in a secret tunnel that led from there and passes under the pub,loads of peoplehave spent nights in the celler looking for him lots of press about that.
sorry not to make pacman lane sister inlaw and family turned up from usa in the afternoon not seen them for 18 months had to do the family thing

news on plane crash or should i say all 3,during the war one came down near the old pit killing 2 of the german crew and the story goes thethird member was pichforked and thrown into the burning plane to die dont know how much of this is true but my mum swears she can remember seing a plane outside the pit offices when she was a little girl during the war.just out of intrest the anti aircraft guns were at peckmill farm at the old station turn left at crossroads where pacman lane goes straight on the farm is still there.
the second plane crash was just after the war was a british plane and did crash near ghost wood my uncle and his mates saw it and ran over the fields from there house overlooking the meadows the crew was killed and my mum can remember him being sick and not very happy when he came back.
the third plane crashed in the fifties,the plane an raf wellington skimmed houses at kiveton park before crashing into a field and exploding all the 3 crew members perished.the newspaper report at the time said blazing wreckage was scatterd over a radius of 200 yards and terrifioc heat prevented rescue work by the residents,who had heard the plane over the houses.it is thought that the pilot may have mistaken red warning lights on the roadwork on the side of the field as indicators of an emergency landing strip.it was where danby road area is now.
artical taken from the rotherham advertiser friday feb 25/2005complete with photo.
hope that helps you

I seem to remember talk of a ghost in the Saxon Pub. It might just have been kids' stuff, though!

Didn't there use to be an RAF station at Thorpe Salvin? Were the two British aircraft operating from there?

Whether or not there are headless German ghosts haunting Todwick, I do not know. What I do know is that tales tend to grow in the telling. Hence the ludicrous and untrue folk myth to the ends that a German pilot was hurled alive into the furnaces of a certain Sheffield Steelworks, after his plane had crashed in WW2. The latter story is most likely a bastardisation of what may have happened to some poor, unfortunate RAF pilot, as captured flyers were often handed over to the German populace. The Todwick story is almost certainly untrue too.

Why do I say this? Because, aside from a cynicism borne of listening to macabre tales like the one above, I have it on good authority that the only German plane that crashed in Sheffield landed on Concord Park, Wincobank. The pilot was found dead.

Isn't it always the case that 'someone' knows 'someone' who was 'first at the scene'...

Cheers Timo, that's buggered that thread up nicely :thumbsup: