Flight Artworks

"Time to go: Lancasters on dispersal"
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An RAF Avro Lancaster bomber's crew start the engines on an airfield dispersal to join the stream of other aircraft heading east as the Moon rises over a winter dusk.

Technical note: like many aircraft of the time, Lancasters used an external battery pack on wheels to provide power for starting the engines. Known as a trolley accumulator, or "trolley acc" for short, it was connected for startup then removed before the aircraft taxied out for takeoff.

"Battle of Britain Day"
15 September 1940 was a turning point in the Second World War. This was the day on which Hi**er was left in no doubt that his Luftwaffe not only had failed to achieve the decisive air superiority over the Royal Air Force that he needed to mount a cross-Channel invasion of Britain - but was coming off worst in the conflict.

This picture was commissioned for the RAF's Battle of Britain Memorial Flight Club Yearbook 2015 as part of a series of articles marking the 75th anniversary of the battle. I wrote more about it in this blog post.

On the 15th the Luftwaffe mounted two major attacks on southern England. In the morning, a relatively small force of bombers with much greater fighter support came over to test the defences. This was followed a few hours later by a much bigger operation, involving some 114 bombers, in three main columns, es**rted by several hundred fighters.

In the picture, Heinkel He 111s of KG 53, in the central column, cross Kent heading for London. RAF Fighter Command begins responding: Spitfires from No 66 Squadron make a head-on attack from below, led by Squadron Leader Rupert Leigh in Spitfire R6800 LZ-N. Hurricanes from No 1 (RCAF) Squadron swoop from above. They are being challenged by Messerschmitt Bf109 fighters from JG 3.

The foreground Heinkel He 111 is an H-2 of 3/KG 53, coded A1+EL. It will end up crash landing on a farm in Orsett, Essex, with one dead and three wounded. ..Below it, going into a dive, another 3/KG53 H-2, A1+GL, will be shot to pieces by up to a dozen Spitfires. Two of its crew died and two were wounded when it crashed on farmland at Sandhurst Cross.

Above are some of the experienced pilots of Jagdschwader 3 'Udet' in their yellow-nosed Messerschmitt Bf109 es**rt fighters, including Hptm. Hans von Hahn, recently appointed Gruppenkommandeur of I./JG 3. Already an ace, he will account for another Spitfire this afternoon.
Flying another E-4 from Stab I./JG 3, Ltn. Detlev Rohwer is attacking No 1 (RCAF) pilot Arthur Yuile and damaging his Hawker Hurricane. Wounded, Yuile makes it back to RAF Northolt.

Off to the left in the distance, starting to attract 'ack ack' bursts from the anti-aircraft guns below, are the 19 Dorniers of II./KG3 followed by more Heinkels from I. and II./KG 26. They are about to be hit by the first of a string of fighter squadrons, Spitfires in line astern catching the sunlight as they dive from high above.

"Low-flying Spitfires in winter"
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These Mk IX LF Spitfires were optimised for low altitude operations - meaning about 20,000ft. But a couple of pilots from 222 Squadron take advantage of a break in the rain and mist in early December 1943 to get in some very low flying practice near their base in Essex.

At the time the regular pilot of MH434 (foreground) was New Zealander Bill Burge, who retired to Australia and died at the age of 99. MH434 is still flying but this Flight Artworks realisation restores it to its wartime appearance.

"Morning return: Lancasters at sunrise"
As a winter dawn breaks, RAF Avro Lancaster bombers make their final approaches to an airfield in the east of England.

"D-Day Operation Mallard"
D-Day, 6 June 1944: the Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe. As the troops established a foothold in Normandy they were protected, reinforced and supplied by thousands of warplanes which had total air superiority over the German Luftwaffe. The weather - poor at first - became mostly clear later with some haze and scattered cloud.

The picture depicts that evening's Operation Mallard which delivered the British 6th Airborne Division aboard gliders towed by a variety of heavy aircraft, including these unarmed Short Stirlings of Nos 196 and 299 Squadrons. They were es**rted by (top right) North American Mustang IIIs from the RAF's No 315 (Polish) Squadron and, in the centre, Mk VA Supermarine Spitfires from No 345 Squadron. Top left: South African fighter ace, Group Captain AG ‘Sailor’ Malan, Commanding Officer of No 145 (Free French) Wing, flew his Mk IXB Spitfire - with long-range fuel tank - as a section leader with No 340 (GC/IV/2 'Ile de France') Squadron on the glider es**rt. The Hawker Typhoons, lower right, are bomb-carrying 'Bomphoons' of No 197 Squadron who were on an armed reconnaissance sortie at the same time.

"Above and beyond: Jimmy Ward VC"
On the night of 7/8 July 1941, Vickers Wellington L7818, AA-R of No 75 (New Zealand) Squadron RAF, was returning to base at Feltwell in Norfolk after an attack on Munster in Germany when it was hit by cannon shells from a Luftwaffe Me 110 night fighter.

These ruptured various systems - the bomb bay doors fell open and the undercarriage partially lowered - while a fire began in a fuel line which threatened to spread across the fabric-covered wing. The second pilot, Sergeant James Ward, volunteered to try to douse the flames with a cockpit cover. With just a dinghy rope around his waist, he clambered out of the astrodome, bashing hand and foot-holds in the fuselage and wing to gain some grip. By his own account he probably had little real effect on the flames, which were going past his shoulder "like a blow torch", while the tremendous slipstream wrenched the cover from his grasp. Nevertheless they made it back to England and his extraordinarily courageous effort to save his crewmates earned him the Victoria Cross - albeit with some debate among the powers that be as to whether he deserved it, given the "element of self-preservation" in what he had done.

Ward was shot down and killed while bombing Hamburg some nine weeks later. He was 22.

"Gunner's call"
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"Corkscrew right, go!" In WWII, bomber crews' best defence against night fighters was not to be seen. RAF air gunners were trained not to open fire unless they felt they had to, because doing so immediately gave away the position of their aircraft.

The gunners were the bomber's eyes and if a German night fighter was spotted the first response was evasion. A gunner's intercom shout would cue the pilot to throw the big aircraft into diving and climbing turns. And if it was obvious they had been seen by the predator, firing the .303 machine guns at close range - below about 400 yards - was at least a deterrent and might even cause damage.

"Battle of Britain duellists: Spitfire and Bf 109"
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Two of the fighter aircraft that epitomised the struggle in the skies over southern England in 1940, an RAF Supermarine Spitfire and a Luftwaffe Messerschmitt Bf 109, go head-to-head in a deadly encounter, leaving condensation trails at more than 20,000ft. Below, German bombers cross the Kent coast as a squadron of Hawker Hurricanes moves in to attack.

"Armed reconnaissance Mosquito over the North Sea"
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A De Havilland Mosquito of RAF Coastal Command over a rough North Sea on a reconnaissance sortie looking for coastal shipping targets in German-occupied Norway in 1944. These aircraft from 333 (Norwegian) Squadron were used in roles that maximised the crews' knowledge of their homeland's geography.

"RAF Coastal Command Vickers Warwick ASR"
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A Vickers-Armstrongs Warwick air-sea rescue aircraft over the North Sea in late 1944.

This picture was made to commemorate Warwick number BV233 of 279 Squadron RAF, coded RL-J, an early ASR type which carried two sets of inflatable dinghies in the bomb bay. The aircraft stalled and crashed at low-level during a training sortie near RAF Thornaby in the north-east of England on 7 January 1945, killing all six crew.

The Warwick somewhat resembles a 'stretched' Wellington but they were developed in parallel. The Warwick was superseded by four-engined heavy bombers but found a successful niche in Coastal Command service.

"Pattle Hurricane air combat"
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South African RAF pilot Flt Lt Marmaduke Thomas St. John 'Pat' Pattle fires his newly-delivered Hawker Hurricane fighter's eight machine guns for the first time, downing a Fiat G.50bis 'Freccia' of the Italian air force near Berat in Albania on 20 February 1941.

Pattle and others from 80 Squadron, based at the time at Paramythia in northern Greece, were es**rting Bristol Blenheim bombers of 84, 211 and 30 Squadrons in an attack on Berat. As the Blenheims left the target area they ran into Regia Aeronautica fighters climbing out of Berat airfield - who were 'bounced' by the Hurricanes.

Pattle’s section took on four of the attackers and he singled out the leading G.50. It turned sharply but he stayed with it and blew it to pieces.

Pilot Officer Geary, air gunner in Squadron Leader Gordon-Finlayson's Blenheim, said later: "A G.50 came for us and in a flash a Hurricane just shot it off our wingtip. It simply rolled over, went on fire, and dived into the mountain. It was wizard." The Italian pilot, Tenente Alfredo Fusco, was killed.

"Bomber county: Lincolnshire sunset, 1943"
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Avro Lancasters from No 44 (Rhodesia) Squadron departing south-eastwards over the city of Lincoln from RAF Dunholme Lodge. Navigators in charge, each aircraft would make its own way to its operating altitude before converging at a pre-determined time for the long haul to Germany. Fully laden with bombs, ammunition and fuel, the older machines would labour to make height.

"The Few"
A depiction of Hawker Hurricane fighters of No 1 Squadron RAF going into action over the south of England against Heinkel He 111 bombers of the German Luftwaffe, with Messerschmitt Bf 110 heavy fighter es**rt, on 16 August 1940.

The squadron's operations record book reported: "In the afternoon the squadron was engaged in its most successful action in England to date."

Squadron Leader David Pemberton made the first attack "to the beam and from in front", bringing down one of the Heinkels in flames with his first burst. His engine then caught fire - possibly because returning gunfire had caused an oil leak - but before he had decided to bail out the flames subsided, and he landed safely.

Pilot Officer Peter Matthews followed him in, picking out one Bf 110 from a formation of five attacking a Hurricane, and sent it down in flames.

In all, that Saturday, the squadron claimed 4 He 111 destroyed and 2 probably; 1 Ju 88 destroyed, and 2 Me 110s destroyed, while losing only one Hurricane whose pilot was unhurt.

This was the day on which Prime Minister Winston Churchill visited the headquarters of RAF Fighter Command's 11 Group at Uxbridge and saw that at one point during the afternoon's heavy combat, all the Group's fighter squadrons were in action, with no reserves.

As he left, Churchill said to his chief of staff, Hastings Ismay: "Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few."

Happy birthday to John "Paddy" Hemingway, last of The Few: 105 today. In my picture
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a Hawker Hurricane Mk I of No 85 Squadron pulls a lead on a Messerschmitt Bf 109-E of the attacking Luftwaffe at about 12,000ft over the North Kent coast during the Battle of Britain in August 1940.a

I hear Airfix have announced the first 1:24 scale Supermarine Spitfire Mk.VIII, which is sure to excite the modelling folk. Here's my earlier:
"Shark mouth Spitfire"
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A portrait of Spitfire Mk VIII A58-631 coded ZP-V with 457 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force. The aircraft carried the "Grey Nurse" squadron's striking shark's mouth insignia.

457's Spitfires had been shipped out to the squadron from the UK, arriving in their standard RAF camouflage pattern. The Australians changed the original red, white and blue roundels and fin flashes to their own white and blue, differently-sized versions and patched up the camo with local Foliage Green and Dark Sea Grey. Yellow wing leading edges initially were painted white, but when word came down to drop that, they were overpainted too. The result was a motley finish that varied from aircraft to aircraft.

"Beaufighters attacking E-boats"
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Six Bristol Beaufighters from No 236 Squadron, part of RAF Coastal Command's North Coates Strike Wing, strafing Kriegsmarine e-boats (schnellboot in German) along the French coast in June 1944.

Hit-and-run raids by these fast German torpedo boats posed a significant threat to Allied mariners on the D-Day invasion, support and resupply vessels. My picture depicts a typical early morning operation to hunt for them. New Zealand Squadron Leader "Bill" Tacon has led the attack with cannon and 25lb rocket projectiles in TF X Beaufighter NE746, MB-Q - sustaining some damage to the aircraft in what the squadron's operations book records as "intense accurate" 20 and 40 mm return fire.

"RAF Mosquitos above clouds"
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De Havilland Mosquito fighter bombers, the most produced version of arguably the best aircraft of the Second World War. Fast, powerful, strong and easily repaired, De Havilland's twin engine, timber-built "Wooden Wonder" proved amazingly versatile in fighter, bomber, pathfinder and reconnaissance roles, day and night.