There was no room for complacency for Allied aircrew as the war approached its end. Sixty years ago tomorrow the Luftwaffe cooked up an unpleasant surprise and hit them at their most vulnerable point - their home bases. Mark Foster reports.

The crews of the Allied bombers returning to base 60 years ago today were alert but relaxed.

The worst of their mission was over and soon they would be touching down on friendly ground.

But this was the Night of the Intruders, when the Luftwaffe belatedly deployed a tactic which, if used earlier in the war, could have neutralised the operations of Bomber Command.

And the final run to home ended in tragedy for many - including the crew of the last German aircraft to crash on British soil during the Second World War.

The Bomber Command mission scheduled for that evening was a dual attack, involving more than 500 aircraft, on the synthetic oil producing plant at Kamen and on the Dortmund-Elms canal.

The mission ran smoothly - until the return, when they ran into trouble in the form of the Luftwaffe's Operation Gisela.

About 200 Junkers JU88s of the Nachtjagdeschwader Gruppen - night fighter destroyer group - were waiting to intercept the bombers returning to base at their most vulnerable point, just before landing.

The night was clear and some of the returning aircraft had inexplicably switched on their navigation lights earlier than usual, despite warnings of the dangers of possible predators. The circling intruders were given an enticing target.

Hauptmann Johann Dreher had already claimed two Halifaxes that night and set his sights on a French 347 Squadron Halifax, returning to RAF Elvington, near York.

At 1.50am as Capitaine Notelle approached Elvington, North Yorkshire, in his Halifax, he received warning of the attack, just as the airfield lights went out. He pulled his aircraft up and headed north for Croft, near Darlington, narrowly escaping being shot down.

The nightfighter continued its attack on Elvington and strafed a passing taxi. But circling for another pass at 1.51am, the JU88 was too low. It clipped a tree and crashed into Dunnington Lodge, a farmhouse on the outskirts of the airfield. Machine gun fire from the fighter had strafed the farmhouse, before the aircraft crashed through one section of the building.

Inside, farmer Richard Moll and his wife, Helen 60, were awake, having been startled by the gunfire, and their daughter-in-law, Violet, 29, was making her way to their bedroom when the aircraft struck.

Her husband, Fred, saved the life of their three-year-old son Edgar, by scooping the child up in one arm and, with fire extinguisher in the other, fought his way through flames and debris to the outside.

Tragically, both his wife and mother died as a result of their injuries. Richard Moll survived initially, but suffered severe burns and died later.

The JU88 ended up in a field at the junction of the Elvington and Dunnington roads. Hauptmann Dreher and his crew of three all died. Meanwhile, on the way to Croft, Notelle's Halifax was attacked again and was shot three times by fire from the JU88 of Feldwebel Gunther Schmidt.

Read the full story in tomorrow's Northern Echo.