Little known fact. Whitburn village duck pond, behind the church, was only created during the war when a twin engined bomber was chased off a raid on the Tyne and jettisoned its bomb load to increase speed. I was told this on a local message board. I never knew that
Then a year or two later my aunt died (they'd lived a couple of hundred metres from the pond throughout my youth). I visited my cousin with intention of archiving her history (and Uncle Rob's — Western Desert, Italy, Normandy to the Baltic with 7 Armd Div). Among her possessions I found a picture postcard of Whitburn duck pond, dated 1935. Wtf was a German raider doing bombing the Tyne in 1935?!?