On top of page 387 in Graham Warner’s “Bristol Blenheim History” a photo is shown of two 13 Sqdn Blenheims demonstrating their under nose sirens. I believe this photo to be a still from newsreel footage covering April 23 1942 army co-op exercises and am 99 % certain the aircraft in the background is Blenheim T2254, I – OO, the subject of my ongoing research.
The exercise in question has been covered by no less than 5 film companies and so far I have seen the newsreels of Pathé, British Movietone & Gaumont British and although the similarity between the Blenheim “siren sequence” in those films and the still is remarkable I have not yet found a perfect match. I have been unable to find out the origin of that photo via Mr Warner however. If anyone out there has seen that photo in print before then I’d love to hear from them. I know where I could obtain DVD copies of the newsreels from the 2 remaining production companies but as that is pretty expensive I’d like to try it this way first!
Here’s a scan of the still/photo in question, a photo of T2254 at Odiham taken late March or early April 1942 as well as the still of the British Pathé newsreel, all for comparison.
TIA for any help, tips or comments.
Walter
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January 3, 2009 at 8:12 pm