IT has been a just over 50 years since Beatlemania gripped Amesbury, when crowds gathered to see the band as they filmed scenes from their second feature length movie Help!

The Journal broke the news in May 1965 that the Fab Four would be visiting to film with the army on Salisbury Plain.

Staying in the Antrobus Arms hotel they remained largely out of the public gaze but that did not stop “groups of young, very young and not-so young – fans waiting outside the town’s hotels”.

“There were times when the police had to ease people back from the main roads through the town,” the report from the Journal added. “But there were few who actually saw the Beatles, even fewer who were able to exchange greetings.”

Reportedly, the black Austin Princess limousine the band used was left unlocked in the hotel’s garage and desperate fans ransacked Beatles caps, T-shirts and even cigarette ends.

Now Richard Houghton is looking to collate memories of the Beatles for a new book he is writing on the band. Aside from their trip to Larkhill the Fab Four made one other trip Salisbury, playing at the City Hall in 1963.

Richard said: “Britain was a very different place then to what it is now and I’m hoping to capture the memories of the people who were probably teenagers then and who are probably grandparents now so that their recollections can be captured for all time. The show in Salisbury would have been an opportunity to see the Beatles on the cusp of becoming a social phenomenon.”

The Beatles went on to top the UK charts 17 times in the 1960s but there are very few accounts of their performance in Salisbury.

“I am hoping some readers will have been there on that night and can help me paint a picture of what the Fab Four were like before they became really famous,” Richard added.

His most recent book, You Had To Be There: The Rolling Stones Live 1962–69 features memories of two performances the band made at the City Hall on October 27, 1963 and March 18, 1964.

Help! was released on July 29, 1965 and the plotline features a plot to hunt down drummer Ringo Starr. The Salisbury Plain scene was filmed near Larkhill and sees the band record George Harrison song ‘I Need You’ with tanks from 3 Division, Royal Artillery in the background.

Email Richard at thebeatlesinthe60s@gmail.com or write to 7 Hartley Road, Manchester, M21 9NG.