The previous post touched upon the early history of the village of New Gilston. The above 1930s view of the village shows the Post Office on the right foreground looking west. The Post Office was at the centre of a tragic incident back in 1953. On Saturday 22 August that year a Gloster Meteor aircraft, which had taken off from RAF Leuchars only ninety seconds before, crashed into the Post Office in the early morning around 6 am. The pilot was instantly killed. He was 21-year-old Flying Officer David Ernest Rock (born in Lichfield, Staffordshire in 1932). Amazingly, no one on the ground was seriously hurt.
The jet which crashed had been flying with a second plane and both had begun to descend from 2000 feet, thinking they were over the sea. In fact they were over the highest village in Fife. The lead aircraft saw ground and pulled up striking some trees and eventually returned to base. The second jet struck the upper storey of the Post Office building and broke up. Occupants of the building, Mr and Mrs Andrew Laing Ramage, had been asleep on the ground floor at the time.
The jet which crashed had been flying with a second plane and both had begun to descend from 2000 feet, thinking they were over the sea. In fact they were over the highest village in Fife. The lead aircraft saw ground and pulled up striking some trees and eventually returned to base. The second jet struck the upper storey of the Post Office building and broke up. Occupants of the building, Mr and Mrs Andrew Laing Ramage, had been asleep on the ground floor at the time.
Wreckage was strewn about the village, the blast broke several windows, live ammunition was scattered about, the school roof was damaged and a neighbouring cottage had its chimney knocked off the roof. Andrew Ramage described how he and his wife Christina initially thought that their house had been struck by lightning. When the roof collapsed they were immediately covered in plaster and could not speak for the dust in their mouths. First they tried to get out of the door that led to the shop but found that it was blocked with rubble. Instead they made for the front door but could not get past the flames, so finally they smashed a window in order to get outside, with help from lime quarry worker Alexander Barclay. Their only injuries were cuts from the broken window glass. The only possessions they had left were the night clothes they were wearing.
All but one of the local phone lines was taken down by the accident. The school house line was still intact and was used to call the fire brigade. Engines came from St Andrews, Cupar, Methil and from R.A.F. Leuchars. Mrs Christian Randall, who lived at the school house with her two children took in the Ramages and they three are shown in the photograph below. Firemen recovered very little from the site - only some charred bank notes, some blackened coins and an intact case of 12 bottles of whisky.
On the Monday, Mr and Mrs Ramage moved into a nearby cottage and their friends and neighbours rallied around to provide them with clothes, furniture and bedding. Their shop delivery van survived and was out delivering newspapers as usual the day after the crash - driven by a friend. The image further below shows the destroyed Post Office and workers clearing the crash site. Mr and Mrs Ramage took some time off to recover from their ordeal (which had come only months after they had lost their only son in a motor accident at Teasses Toll). The Post Office eventually moved to the other end of the village, where it was run by a Mrs Winton.
Sources: Dundee Courier 24 August; Fife Herald 26 August; St Andrews Citizen 29 August; Aberdeen Evening Express 22 August
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