On 20 March 1918, while on a night patrol with his gunner-observer First Air Mechanic Albert Stagg, the pair shot down a Gotha G.V bomber in their Bristol F.2 Fighter 'Devil-in-the-Dark'.
The bomber came down in a bean field off Roman Road, 200 yards from Albert Dock, East Ham, near the north bank of the Thames.
The then-nineteen year old collected several souvenirs from the wreckage – a piece blue camouflage canvas, charred wood, a cartridge case, and a plywood ammunition box.
[1] While District Commissioner and Governor, he published articles in the Sudan Notes and Records on many topics, including archaeology, anthropology, geography, and science.
Systematic mapping and recording of sites and finds was also implemented; this work later aided in the UNESCO campaign to salvage monuments from the rising Lake Nasser.
As soon as he returned to his post, the first official excavations carried out by the Antiquities Service began on a prehistoric site near the Khartoum civil hospital,[5] and later at Shaheinab in 1949,[6] revealing information about Sudanese prehistory for the first time.
The excavations at Khartoum revealed the existence of a pottery-producing culture that utilised stone tools, described as 'Mesolithic' who lived in a period when the climate was much wetter.
Over the course of his career, Arkell was able to conduct several surveys, documenting among other things the existence of massive iron works in Meroe[citation needed] and the extensive predynastic culture of Egypt, notably the Badarians.
[7] Upon his retirement from the Sudan he accepted the post of lecturer in Egyptian archaeology at University College London and became Honorary Curator of the Petrie Collection.