A HAMPSHIRE community gathered to pay their respects to the US Second World War pilot who saved their town from disaster.

The ceremony took place 60 years to the day from when Captain Robert Cogswell personally steered a B-17 bomber away from Alresford, near Winchester, when it got into trouble over the town.

The plucky pilot had ordered all the other nine crewmen to bail out first and only jumped out himself when he was sure the plane had missed the centre of Alresford on September 26, 1943.

American Major Barry Hoffman, currently serving at Worthy Down Barracks near Winchester, unveiled a memorial plaque at the ceremony at Soke Gardens, off Broad Street, close to Old Alresford Pond where the plane finally came down out of harm's way.

"This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and I am so proud to be here. Someone put their life on the line and we hope everyone in uniform would aspire to do the same if put in that situation," said Maj Hoffman.

George Watson, 70, of Broad Street, was an eyewitness on the day the plane came down and was present at Friday's service.

"I remember there was a hell of a bang and a great pool of smoke," he said. "All the kids rushed to get as close as we could and we gathered up guns that had been scattered. The police came fairly quickly and took them off us. I think Alresford could well have been wiped out then if they had left it to us!"

Another eyewitness, Len Pearce, 81, of Jacklyns Lane, was 21 at the time of the accident and was on leave from the RAF.

"If it hadn't been for that pilot most of the town would have almost certainly disappeared," he said.

The memorial was the idea of Eddie Deerfield, a member of the crew who parachuted to safety somewhere between Southampton and Winchester.

Speaking by e-mail to the Daily Echo from his Florida home, Mr Deerfield, the last surviving crew member, said: "I'm very pleased that it has finally happened. If the American pilot hadn't remained at the controls of the bomb-laden B-17 bomber to guide it away from the town before it crashed, the consequence might have been the area's greatest calamity of the war."

Capt Cogswell was medically grounded and didn't fly another mission with the 303 Bomb Group. He went home to train on B-29 bombers and, in 1951, was killed during the Korean War.