A fragment from legendary aviator Amy Johnson’s stricken plane will go on show at a Kent museum after being sold off at auction.

Believed to be the only piece of the aircraft in existence, the section from her parachute exit door was retrieved after her fatal crash into the Thames Estuary near Herne Bay on January 5, 1941.

Now the artefact has been acquired by the Kent Battle of Britain Museum at Hawkinge following keen bidding at Hansons Auctioneers today where the hammer eventually fell at £2,800.

Chairman, curator and volunteer at the museum, Dave Brocklehurst says he is delighted to acquire the relic.

“Amy was one of the original Air Transport Auxiliary girls and it will join our ATA display.

“It’s important to commemorate someone who lost her life in Herne Bay, preserve a piece of history and keep it in Kent.”

The first woman to fly solo from London to Australia, pioneering Amy was just 37, and broke the mould for women and raised expectations about what they could achieve in life.

In the pre-war years, she worked as a commercial pilot, a journalist, and even a fashion model, creating her own travelling bag.

The pioneering pilot was on a routine 90-minute journey from Kidlington near Oxford in an Airspeed Oxford. But four hours later she was parachuting into the Thames Estuary, more than 100 miles off course.

Reportedly, she had bailed out after running out of fuel but her body was never found. Only the fragment of her aircraft, her flying bag, log book and cheque book were recovered, which makes it a unique acquisition in aviation history.

Head of militaria at Hansons, Matt Crowson, said: “I was amazed to receive an email asking if I’d be interested in a piece of Amy Johnson’s aircraft wreckage.

“The item was inherited by our vendor from his uncle, Ronald Arthur Clark, both from Enfield, who back in 1941 was an able seaman on HMS Berkeley, an escort vessel in the English Channel.

“It was among ships which attempted to rescue Amy after her parachute was spotted coming down. She was seen alive in the water, calling for help. However, conditions were poor, there was a heavy sea and a strong tide, snow was falling and it was intensely cold.

“Ropes were thrown to Amy but she couldn’t reach them. Her flying bag, log book and cheque book later washed up nearby.

“Ronald said he’d scooped the fragment of aircraft out of the water and put it in his pocket.

“Its discovery is significant because no other pieces of the aircraft are thought to exist.

“The vendor remembers his uncle telling him the story in the 1950s and showing him the fragment. The technical aspects of the style of manufacture, paint colours, service records, anecdotal evidence, and the fact that this type of aircraft would not have routinely been in the area, all added up to it being correct.

“But some suspected her plane had been brought down by friendly fire which was then covered up to avoid the bad publicity.”

Sussex man Tom Mitchell claimed to have shot her aircraft down when she twice failed to give the correct identification code during the flight.

He is reported to have said: “Sixteen rounds of shells were fired and the plane dived into the Thames Estuary.

“We all thought it was an enemy plane until the next day when we read the papers and discovered it was Amy. But officers told us never to tell anyone what happened.”