Date:	Thursday 16 October 1941
Time:	night
Type:	Boulton Paul Defiant Mk I
Owner/operator:	96 Sqn RAF
Registration:	T3921
MSN:
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 2
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Shining Tor, Near the Cat & Fiddle pub, Buxton, Derbyshire -   United Kingdom
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Cranage, Middlewich, Cheshire
Destination airport:

Narrative:
Boulton Paul Defiant Mk.I T3921, 96 Squadron, RAF Cranage, Middlewich, Cheshire. Written off (destroyed) 16 October 1941 when crashed at Shining Tor, Near the Cat & Fiddle pub, on the A537 from Macclesfield to Buxton Road, near Buxton, Derbyshire. According to the official file at the National Archives at Kew (File AIR 81/9668 - see link #3): "Pilot Officer M G Hilton, Sergeant H Brunckhorst (RAAF): injured; aircraft accident near Buxton, Defiant T3921, 96 Squadron, 16 October 1941"

Crew of Defiant T3921:
Pilot Oficer (66587) Michael George HILTON RAFVR - pilot - injured
Howard Walter BRUNCKHORST (AUS404438) RAAF - W/Op & Air Gunner - injured

Of minor interest is the fact that Howard Walter BRUNCKHORST later served on No.277 Squadron on air-sea rescue duties. You will find mention of him in Norman Franks' book. "Another Kind of Courage" (pp.34, 145 & 215, albeit, with his name misspelled as F/Sgt H W BRUCK-HORST!). He was instrumental (along with, P/O P.C.Standen and F/O F.E.Wilson), in the rescue of No.609 Squadron's, P/2217 P/O Tadeusz Stanislaw TUREK Polish AF (pilot of Typhoon IB JP745, hit by Flak, ditched 20-9-43), off the French coast, on 21-9-1943

Shining Tor is the highest hill in Cheshire, England. The summit has a maximum elevation of 559 metres (1834 feet) above sea level. It is in the Peak District, between the towns of Macclesfield in Cheshire and Buxton in Derbyshire, and is on the administrative boundary between Derbyshire and Cheshire East. The hill is at the south end of a north-south moorland ridge, which also includes Cats Tor, 519 metres (1,703 ft) high.

The Cat and Fiddle Inn is the second-highest public house in England, the Tan Hill Inn in County Durham being the highest. The Inn is in the Peak District National Park, on the A537 road just west of the Derbyshire/Cheshire county boundary, on the western side of Axe Edge Moor, 1,689 feet (515 m) above sea level.

Until the spring of 2005 it was thought that the crash site had been located on the eastern side of Shining Tor, this however was wrong. It is now known that the scar filled with small bits of metal actually belonged to Noorduyn UC-64A Norseman 43-35439, which cashed on Shining Tor on 29 September 1944. This now means that the search begins all over again with the whole of Shining Tor and the surrounding area being considered as a possible location.

1. Royal Air Force Aircraft T1000-V9999 (James J Halley, Air Britain 1997)
2. Aircraft Wrecks: A Walker's Guide: Historic Crash Sites on the Moors and Mountains of the British Isles By Alan Clark, Nick Wotherspoon, Mark Sheldon
3. ORB 96 Squadron for October 1940 to December 1943: National Archives (PRO Kew) File AIR 27/764: https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C2503402
4. National Archives (PRO Kew) File AIR 81/9668: https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C16997915
5. https://peakwreckhunters.blogspot.com/2010/07/noorduyn-uc-64a-norseman-43-35439-or.html
6. https://www.middlewich-heritage.org.uk/RAF_Cranage/raf-cranage-1941.html
7. https://www.rafcommands.com/database/serials/details.php?uniq=T3921
8. https://www.peakdistrictaircrashes.co.uk/crash_sites/peak-district/boulton-paul-defiant-t3921-buxton/
9. https://www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=1436580&resourceID=19191
10. https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/aircraft-wrecks-in-the-peak-district-july-2020-pic-heavy.124483/page-2
11. https://air-britain.com/pdfs/military/Crashes_Wales_and_West_Midlands.pdf
12. https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C2676011
13. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_and_Fiddle_Inn
14. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shining_Tor

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
15-Jan-2011 16:26	ThW	Added
12-Jan-2012 13:13	Nepa	Updated [Aircraft type, Operator, Departure airport]
20-Apr-2015 04:13	angels one five	Updated [Operator, Location, Departure airport, Narrative]
20-Apr-2015 04:59	Tu144	Updated [Operator, Departure airport, Narrative]