Anglesey 1943, filmed by Fred Pedley

© Fred Pedley
A family camping trip to Anglesey, North Wales in spring 1943. The Pedley family camped at Trecastell farm, Llangoed near Beaumaris. Film includes shots of the slipway at Fryars Bay, Beaumaris pier, castle, green and Castle Street, horse drawn plough work on the farm and boats on the Menai Straits including gunboats and Catalina seaplanes which were refitted at Saunders Roe factory in Llanfaes. Footage of the Catalinas includes them flying, taking off and landing and moored up by Beaumaris pier.
Saunders Roe in Fryars Bay, Anglesey converted American and Canadian build Catalina flying boats and equipped them with top secret ASV radars and other extra British equipment for anti-submarine warfare. Fred’s firm built the bomb and depth charge racks for the PBYs. One of these Catalinas which had been upgraded by S-R in Beaumaris found the German battleship Bismarck in 1941. Was this the one?
In 1940, the Government decided to order Consolidated Catalina aircraft from the USA to replace the Saunders-Roe (Saro) Lerwick flying boat, which was proving to be not fit for task, due to handling issues. Delivery of the Catalinas commenced in early 1941, and conversion work was required to meet Air Ministry specifications. The flying boat manufacturer Saunders-Roe were contracted to undertake this work. Saunders-Roe produced flying boats (the Supermarine Walrus and its successor, the Sea Otter) on the Isle of Wight. This location left Saunders-Roe extremely vulnerable to enemy attack and a safer location was sought for the Catalina conversion work.
The Menai Straits were found to be an excellent location for flying boat operations, and the company purchased the Burton’s Fryars estate near Beaumaris in 1940. The Saro Shrimp was one of the aircraft that first appeared here in the summer of 1940. Saunders Roe dismantled one of their spare hangars at Cowes and re-erected it on site in August 1941. The Ministry of Aircraft Production then built a further hangar and workshops on the site in December 1941, linked to the foreshore by a concrete slipway.
For four years there were flying boats stretching from the Gazelle Hotel down to Fryars Bay. In all, 399 Catalinas came through the site. Substantial work was conducted to prepare them for various roles with both the RAF and the Royal Navy.
After the war Saunders-Roe transferred their shipbuilding operations to the site. An experimental Auster floatplane was evaluated at Beaumaris in 1944, 1949 and again in 1955. However, it was found to be severely lacking in power and the design was never carried forward. The firm also manufactured bus bodies for both London and Cuba. Other vehicle manufacturers went on to take over the site, which closed completely in 1997.
The flying boat slipway remains, as do all the wartime hangars, although they have been significantly modernised.
(From website: Beaumaris - Airfields of Britain Conservation Trust UK (abct.org.uk) )
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13:50 Consolidated PBY Catalina flying boats. I understand were flown from the factories in the USA and Canada and modified for RAF coastal command use at Saunders Roe. Fred’s company made the depth charge racks for anti submarine use.