Editing Lincoln Cathedral (section)

=== Wartime history ===

Sometime during the later stages of the Second World War, the accomplished RAF pilot and future Black British civil rights leader, [[Billy Strachan]], almost crashed his aircraft into Lincoln Cathedral. Strachan credited this experience with ending his piloting career, as he found it psychologically impossible to continue flying combat missions.<ref name=":16">{{Cite book |last=Horsley |first=David |title=Billy Strachan 1921–1988 RAF Officer, Communist, Civil Rights Pioneer, Legal Administrator, Internationalist and Above All Caribbean Man |publisher=Caribbean Labour Solidarity |year=2019 |location=London |pages=11 |language=en |issn=2055-7035}}</ref>

Lincolnshire was home to many [[RAF Bomber Command|Bomber Command]] airfields during the Second World War, giving rise to the nickname of "Bomber County".<ref>{{cite web|last=Halpenny|first=Bruce|title=The Airfields of 'Bomber County'|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/lincolnshire/hi/people_and_places/history/newsid_8321000/8321216.stm|publisher=BBC Lincolnshire|access-date=13 December 2011|date=29 October 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120804122656/http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/lincolnshire/hi/people_and_places/history/newsid_8321000/8321216.stm|archive-date=4 August 2012|url-status=live}}</ref> The station badge for the nearby [[RAF Waddington]] depicts Lincoln Cathedral rising through the clouds.<ref>{{cite web|title=RAF Waddington History|url=http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafwaddington/aboutus/history.cfm|publisher=Royal Air Force|access-date=13 December 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111206234437/http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafwaddington/aboutus/history.cfm|archive-date=6 December 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> Until the opening of the [[RAF Bomber Command Memorial]] in 2012, the cathedral had the only memorial in the United Kingdom dedicated to Bomber Command's large losses of aircrew in the Second World War.<ref>Antiques Roadshow, from Lincoln Cathedral</ref><ref name="BBC20060824">{{cite news|title='Bomber county' to get memorial|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/lincolnshire/5281590.stm|work=BBC News|access-date=13 December 2011|date=24 August 2006}}</ref>

During the war, "priceless British treasures" were placed in a chamber sixty feet beneath the cathedral for safekeeping.<ref name="treas1943">{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article82006595 |title=Planted Under Lincoln Cathedral. |newspaper=[[The Singleton Argus|Singleton Argus (NSW : 1880–1954)]] |location=NSW |date=18 January 1943 |access-date=12 November 2013 |page=1 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref> This did not include the cathedral's copy of [[Magna Carta]] as it was on loan in the [[United States]].<ref name="treas1943" />