RAF Wigtown

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RAF Wigtown was a Royal Air Force station in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. It sits on the Machars peninsula near Wigtown, east of Stranraer and south of Newton Stewart, beside the River Bladnoch. Built in 1941, it opened as a relief landing ground for RAF West Freugh. Because its grass runways flooded, two concrete runways were added in 1942.

The station was mainly a training base. It housed No. 1 Air Observers School from September 1941 to February 1942, then No. 1 (Observers) Advanced Flying Unit until November 1945, under RAF Training Command and No. 29 Group. It hosted short-term operational squadrons, including 114 Squadron with Bristol Blenheims in 1941, and later 174, 175 and 182 Squadrons with Hawker Typhoons in 1943. A small team, No. 3206 Servicing Commando, was based there briefly in 1943.

Flying operations stopped in 1945; 14 Maintenance Unit operated from 1946 to 1948, and a Bomber Command Trials Unit with Avro Lancasters used the airfield from 1947 to 1948. The station closed in May 1948 and was handed to civilian use.

The airfield remains largely intact, with the original control tower and many roads still visible, though locals often call it Baldoon Airfield. In the 1980s the Baldoon Flying Group used it; today the site is mostly farmland, used for walking, cycling and some light industry, including a sawmill.