In 1978 a Nottinghamshire brewery, Hardys and Hansons, built a new public house on Mickley Lane. A competition was held to find a suitable name and the brewery chose that suggested by Seymour Shepley of Woodthorpe Hall, which lies a few hundred yards away in the parish of Holmesfield. This is the story behind the name, one that is both sad and inspiring.

The Shepley family came to Woodthorpe Hall in 1926. Jack and Emily Shepley had four sons, Seymour, Rex, Frank and Douglas, and a daughter, Jeanne. A fifth son, Peter, had died as a child. All four sons went to Oundle School in Northamptonshire and eventually both Rex and Douglas joined the pre-war Royal Air Force. Jeanne Shepley joined the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry when the possibility of war first cast its dark shadow in early 1939. On the outbreak of war, Frank joined the Sheffield Artillery Volunteers. Seymour, the oldest son, was in a reserved occupation.

Tragedy first struck the Shepley family in the early months of the war. Early in 1939 Jeanne had set off on an adventurous journey travelling by land and sea to India. On the outbreak of war Jeanne was determined to return home as soon as possible and she sailed on the SS Yorkshire from Rangoon. The ship arrived safely in Gibraltar and on 13 October 1939 it sailed for England as part of an unescorted merchant convoy.

On 17 October the ship was off the coast of France when it was struck by a torpedo and sank with the loss of 25 crew and 33 passengers, one of whom was Jeanne Shepley who was last seen helping other passengers to the lifeboats. The family still treasure the letters that Jeanne wrote home describing her adventures and the people she met. These were made into a book and privately published in 1948.

On 31 May 1940 the Shepley family sustained a second loss when Rex was was shot down and killed whilst flying his Westland Lysander. He had been undertaking a series of missions to drop essential supplies to the troops who were grimly defending the port of Calais as the British Expeditionary Force were being rescued from the beaches of Dunkirk. He was posthumously awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his gallantry and this is still kept at the family home. Flt Lt Rex Shepley is buried in the Commonwealth War Cemetery at Pihen-les-Guines, 10 kilometres south-south-west of Calais.

In the early summer of 1940 Douglas Shepley had married Frances "Bidy" Linscott, a young nurse from Sidcup in Kent. Douglas was a Spitfire pilot in 152 Squadron stationed at Warmwell in Dorset and was one of "The Few" who fought in the Battle of Britain. He shot down two Messer-schmitt 109s, one on the 8th and the other on 11th of August. On 12 August the squadron was scrambled to defend Ventnor radar station on the Isle of Wight. Pilot Officer Douglas Shepley was last seen pursuing enemy raiders and was shot down over the English Channel, south of the island. His body was never recovered but he is commemorated on Panel 10 of the Runnymede Memorial near Windsor, one of 20,000 RAF aircrew with no known grave.

Devastated as the family were after losing three of their children, they decided to do something positive. Emily and her daughter-in-law Bidy set about raising £5,700 (over £300,000 in today's terms) to buy a new Spitfire. The people of north Derbyshire and south Yorkshire rallied round magnificently organising whist drives, concerts, dances and various other events. There were collections in local cinemas, pubs, theatres and shops and within fifteen weeks the money had been raised. 

The Shepley was first flown on 1 August 1941 and was issued to 602 (City of Glasgow) Squadron on 16 August. Shepley moved on to a Polish squadron and then to a New Zealand squadron before eventually becoming the personal aircraft of Group Captain Victor Beamish DSO DFC AFC, the Station Commander at RAF Kenley in Surrey in 1941. Sadly he too was shot down over the English Channel on 28 March 1942.

That is the story of courage and sacrifice that lies behind the name on our local pub.

 

We thank the Shepley Family for the use of family photographs and access to Jean Shepley's letters.

Douglas Shepley & MG P-type, MG 3880

Richard Verrill has seen our article on The Shepley Family of Woodthorpe Hall and has written to us from Northumberland with this interesting story about Douglas Shepley's car.

I am in the process of writing up my recollections of cars I have been associated with since my birth in 1946, my father’s records have led me to a Google search for Douglas Shepley.

In 1940 my father was a student at King’s College, Newcastle upon Tyne and persuaded my Grandfather to buy a wrecked P type MG, I understand from my father’s notes that the car had belonged to a Flt Lt Douglas Shepley and she had been borrowed by another RAF pilot who unfortunately had driven the car into the back of a tramcar as it was being prepared in the dark for a return journey into the city. Father’s note goes on to report that both pilots had been killed on active duty.

Reading “The Story Behind The Name” THE SHEPLEY SPITFIRE put shivers down my spine.

My father also went to Oundle probably a year or two later than the Shepleys, I have no idea whether he knew that when he acquired MG 3880. I note from the photograph that Douglas was a Pilot Officer not Flt Lt.

Father rebuilt MG 3880, she figured in the courtship and marriage to my mother before he joined the Fleet Air Arm, seeing active duty in the Far East before returning home when I was born and spent many an hour in a carrycot in the back of the little two-seater car.

Here is an image of MG 3880 in Bamburgh, Northumberland after the rebuild in 1940.

My father always regretted selling MG 3880 and in the early 70s he brought another wreck that I inherited in 1990 and am now hoping to finish the rebuild he started some 40 odd years ago.

MG 3880 seems to have disappeared and I live in hope that one day she will be found. I am also hoping the MG Car Club can give me further details from their Abingdon factory records but I would be most interested to learn if there are any photographs or recollections of the car in Shepley hands. 

Yours sincerely 

Richard M. S. Verrill

August 2015