Anxious residents of New Alresford look to the skies and see smoke streaming from a crippled US bomber as it homes in on their town.

The giant Boeing B-17 "Flying Fortress", laden with ten 500lb bombs, rapidly loses height. Suddenly, the unequal struggle is over and there's a huge explosion. The aircraft has crashed near Alresford Pond.

The date is Sunday, September 26th, 1943 and a possible major disaster has just been averted in the picturesque Georgian town.

Many people praise the heroic actions of US Army Air Force pilot, Captain Robert Cogswell, who stays at the controls to the last moment so his aircraft, Lady Luck, will not hit the town.

The "Fort" has been taking part in a bombing raid on German U-boat pens in Nantes, in western France. But the mission has been aborted over the Channel owing to bad weather.

Turning for home, Lady Luck develops a fault in engine number four, causing such severe vibration that the starboard wing begins to disintegrate

The nine other crew bail out near Winchester, leaving Capt Cogswell, who tries to find a safe place to land his stricken aircraft.

Fast forward 59 years and the radio operator, 79-year-old Eddie Deerfield, has returned from the USA to campaign for official recognition for Robert Cogswell's gallant efforts.

"It seems to me only proper that the parish council consider erecting a plaque near the crash site, or elsewhere in the community,

"Present and future generations should know of the courage of an American pilot who, in 1943, prevented what might have been New Alresford's greatest tragedy of World War II."

He says Capt. Cogswell's actions were recognised at the time, detailed in a letter to the Middle Wallop air base, by Mr A.H. Hasted, of Alresford Town Council.

But the only recognition is at the Globe on the Lake pub, where a small plaque with a spelling mistake recounts how he saved "Arlesford". Mr Deerfield visited the pub to meet town council leader, Simon Cook, who assured him the matter would be addressed.

Mr Deerfield also met B-17 buffs and residents who witnessed the final moments of Lady Luck. Nancy Farthing, who lived in Broad Street at the time, remembers the approach of the B-17.

"I thought: 'Gosh! It's going to hit the town.' It just skimmed over the rooftops of Broad Street and then there was this almighty crash."

Bill Brixey was 14 when Lady Luck was "lost in action". He arrived at the crash site a few minutes after impact. "It was like a scene from hell. It stands very vivid in my memories."

Incredibly, the crew of Lady Luck all came through unscathed, though Capt Cogswell sustained back injuries from bailing out at such low altitude.

A unit of Dutch soldiers recovered the plane's remains, including the bombs, shortly after she went in, but few other details of the incident are known owing to wartime censorship.

Indeed, such was the secrecy of the salvage operation that it was long rumoured the complete shell of the B-17 was submerged in Alresford Pond.

Robert Cogswell and Eddie Deerfield regularly exchanged letters after the war. Mr Deerfield says of his pilot: "He saved my life on a number of occasions."

Their friendship ended tragically in 1951 when Cogswell was killed flying a Boeing B-29 "Superfortress" bomber in the Korean War.

Mr Deerfield only found out when his last letter to his wartime colleague came back stamped "MIA" - Missing in Action.

Eddie Deerfield continued his military service, before moving to the US State Department, where he served as a diplomat in Pakistan, India, Canada, Uganda and Malawi. He retired in the mid-1980s with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel.

* Events of September 26th, 1943 are chronicled in Lady Luck - What Really Happened, by Nelson Trowbridge, copies available at Winchester and Alresford libraries.