The flat grassy plateau at Hawkshill Freedown on the southern edge of Walmer parish, adjacent to Walmer Castle, was requisitioned in April 1917 by the War Office for use as an aerodrome to increase capacity for the defence of shipping in the English Channel. The World War I RAF Walmer, also known as Hawkshill Down, was reopened in World War II but not used operationally for aircraft, but for some important radar tracking and jamming systems. The site was also used for propaganda leaflets that were dropped over Germany and France with the balloons released at Walmer.
It is now an open space and has been designated as a Site of Nature Conservation Interest and it has two memorials to those pilots who flew from the airfield, and more information can be found on the Walmer Web website as well as at the local parish one.