End for Battle of Britain factory

By Tom Warren
BBC News

The aluminium plant was camouflaged to protect it from German bombers

In the early 1940s, as the Battle of Britain raged in the skies, one factory worked around the clock producing metal for fighter planes.

The aluminium plant, in Banbury, Oxfordshire, was crucial in the manufacture of new planes for the RAF, including its fleet of Spitfires.

At that time the Northern Aluminium Company factory, known locally as "The Ally", was the UK's only major aluminium-rolling and extrusion plant, employing thousands of people.

Without it the Battle of Britain could have been lost, changing the course of history, it is claimed.

If the Banbury factory hadn't existed, or if it had been seriously bombed, the outcome of the Battle of Britain would have been very different Rob Kinchin-Smith, Banbury Civic Society

This week production ended at the factory, with the loss of 330 jobs.

The closure was blamed on a declining market and increased competition from the Far East and Eastern Europe.

Owner Sapa Profiles wants to sell the site, but a campaign to save the historic rolling mills from demolition has now begun.

Opened in 1931, the factory became hugely important in 1939 at the outbreak of war.

Rob Kinchin-Smith, who has researched the plant's history, said: "It's fair to say that if the Banbury factory hadn't existed or if it had been seriously bombed, the outcome of the Battle of Britain would have been very different.

"At the start of the war quite a number of planes were built of wood and canvas.

"But the Spitfire was an aluminium plane and so was the Lancaster."

Thousands, including many women, worked at the factory during the war

To protect the factory from enemy German aircraft the roof was camouflaged with paintings of fields and a "dummy" plant was even built nearby.

Metal ingots were brought from as far afield as Canada to make the aluminium, and aircraft shot down above Britain were broken up so the metal could be melted down and reused.

"By 1945 the output of Banbury represented a small proportion of the UK's aluminium output. But up until 1943 we needed that factory desperately," said Mr Kinchin-Smith, who is also chairman of Banbury Civic Society.

Today the threat comes from bulldozers not bombers and he is one of a number of campaigners hoping to save the old factory buildings for future generations.

The Art Deco office block, war memorial garden and gates at the site have listed status, but the main rolling mills do not.

'Rose-tinted memories'

"It seems a great pity, given their historical significance, just to let them go," Mr Kinchin-Smith said.

"But you will lose all that resonance, all that memory, all that local pride. And there are lots of good economic reasons for retaining elements of the past in modern development."

John King, 81, worked at the factory during World War II after joining in 1943 as a 16-year-old apprentice in the technical drawing office.

He worked there for 43 years, retiring in 1986.

The Art Deco offices at site have listed status

"We used to see all the old crashed aircraft coming through (for metal to be reused).

"There was a good team spirit, everybody helped everybody."

Mr King, who lives on the edge of Banbury, said he would miss the factory, which in 1960 changed its name to Alcan.

Chris May, Sapa's operations director at Banbury, said there was "almost no chance" of the rolling mills being preserved.

"The buildings are in a very poor condition. The maintenance of the roof is a very big cost to us," he said.

"The main mills will almost certainly be demolished."

Mr May said the landmark buildings would be missed by many.

"I think some of the memories are a bit rose-tinted, but so many people have had generations of the same family working here and certainly during the war period one in four of the working population were at this factory."