I found this lurking in the back of…

And as you can see even today in Belgrade museum JK808/B is still wearing red-white-blue i.e. Croatian flag combination instead Yugoslav blue-white-red 😀

I found it Mark 😀

Mark12 Ah! I re…member Join Date: Jan 2000
Location: Angels one-five over North Bucks.
Posts: 4,123

To wind up this thread

——————————————————————————–

The principal reason for this trip to Belgrade was to confirm the RAF serial and to understand why it now carried the RAF serial “JK808/B”.

The museum were happy to co-operate with removing engine cowlings etc to study data plates and what ever.

The first disappointment from an historical analysis was that the refurbishment had been very thorough, going deep into the structure. This was not a superficial external refinish.

All the cowling had been fully stripped both externally and internally and there was not the slightest evidence of any hand painted identities on the internal surface as is quite normal.

There was not the expected CBAF data plate in the cockpit. In fact the plate just read 17-545.

’17’ is code for the Castle Bromwich dispersal site of Alfred Davies Ltd at Leicester . This ’17’ code on Spitfire data plates is carried by several of the survivors, particularly the Czech/Israeli/Burmese Mk IXs with serials in the TE500 series. My interpretation of this is that as Castle Bromwich changed production to later marks the last of the IXs were displaced or finished in Leicester whilst the factory changed production and fixtures to the later 20 series aircraft. If I am correct, logically the change from Mk V to Mk IX would leave some sweeping up of the very last Mk Vs to be finished at Leicester.

I therefore think the Yugoslav Mk V is one of the very last Mk V’s built.

Enquiring why the museum now considered the aircraft to be “JK808”, they advised that had located the museum register of aircraft and components and the first item in the register and dated 24 July 1961 was Spitfire “9489”. The Yugoslav Airforce records show that 9489 was JK808/B – no problem.

Well there is a problem actually. In the early 1960s the Spitfire had been repainted and carried no serial, save for the code H as it was transferred from Kalemagdon Park, to Zemun and finally Surcin. During this period the tail flash transfered from being horizontal to vertical.

Although I can’t prove it I suspect that at the time the register was written the the aircraft carried no external Yugoslav serial at all. What I do know is that in April 1961 Ken Smy photographed both sides of this machine at Kalemagdon and it carried the Yugoslav serial 9486. 9486 equates to RAF serial MH592. A close examination of that serial shows it to have been applied with identical stencils as others in service and scrapped examples. Indeed it would seem that the boxing of the serial was due to a repaint at Kalemagdon or earlier where the serial was masked off, rather than go to the bother of stencil re-application. This was a common ‘in service’ practise.

The museum’s response to this is flat and unwavering. The register is correct, the aircraft must have been wrongly painted at Kalemagdon as at April 1961.

Not surprisingly I favour the theory that the register scribe inadvertently inverted one of his digits writing ‘9’ instead of ‘6’. The museum will not budge.

Subsequently I have noted a photograph of the last Yugoslav Spitfire to participate in an airshow in 1951 at Pancevo. Interestingly it is 9486.

Here it would have rested save for the recent publication of an excellent book by Tino Jelavic on 352 Squadron. My understanding is that Belgrade is the centre of Serbian culture. It was interesting to note that in the book there are several photographs of MH592/G in service, including shots of the serial MH592 boxed, as the camouflage was changed. MH592 was the personal aircraft of the unit commander Sqd/Ldr Soic, I believe a noted Croation War hero.

It has occurred to me that therein might lie the root of the problem.

For me the aircraft is MH592/G beyond reasonable doubt.

Mark

Photos:-

Current
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65113
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65114
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65115
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65116

Museum register
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65117

Both sides of 9486, boxed, at Kalemagden
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65119
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65144

For comparison the serial stencil and style 9476 in service
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65144

MH592, boxed, in service with 352 Squadron.
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=65144

Noooo Mark… I said only two according to replies in this topic. Obviously my English is not so good 😉

Kansan,
Difference between RAF and NOVJ roundel you can best see here:

You are also not wrong for RAF order of colours on fin but as Yugoslav flag was blue-white-red they had to reverse it to get right order of flag-colours. But in some cases RAF i.e. red-white-blue combination was kept on the fin. Question why is obsolete if you know order of colours on Croatian national flag and story about his Squadron Leader Hinko Soic.

This was his personal Spitfire 😀

Thanks JeT. I am learning so much!! 😀

Rob / Kansan

JeT

Ah! MH592, one of my favourite Spitfires.

Now remind again of the post WWII Yugo serial of this one.

Mark

Could you find old topic and just do copy/paste procedure. That is much easier than write it all over again. Especially for me (read as non-native English speaker)

JeT

Ah! MH592, one of my favourite Spitfires.

Now remind again of the post WWII Yugo serial of this one.

Mark

Noooo Mark… I said only two according to replies in this topic. Obviously my English is not so good 😉

I don’t know how many visits had page novj.asp, because www.yuairwar.com is not mine site. But when site was started, his admin decided to use my book in part about Air War in 2nd WW. As you can see until today them didn’t change the NOVJ page. That is not so strange since I am only author who covered Antifascist side of story in the area.
Later they also decided to publish additional information about local books and models here http://www.yuairwar.com/galerija.asp

Kansan,
Difference between RAF and NOVJ roundel you can best see here:

You are also not wrong for RAF order of colours on fin but as Yugoslav flag was blue-white-red they had to reverse it to get right order of flag-colours. But in some cases RAF i.e. red-white-blue combination was kept on the fin. Question why is obsolete if you know order of colours on Croatian national flag and story about his Squadron Leader Hinko Soic.

This was his personal Spitfire 😀

Thanks for that JeT,

Are you sure your site counter is working because I have looked at it four times?

It is hard to imagine that with over 1250 hits on this thread, only two people have taken a peek at an exciting Spitfire site.

http://www.yuairwar.com/novj.asp

Mark

I’ve been there a couple of times too. I will show more interest. 😀

Mark12,
Is this a good place to talk about roundels on these Spitfires or does this drag things too far off-thread? I was wondering, the NOVJ marking doesn’t look exactly like an RAF roundel overpainted with a Red Star – the underlying ring proporations look a little odd. They also seem to be the B1 rather than C1 roundels and have the older wide fin flash. If the machines had been sitting at an MU before being issued to 352 Sqdn I don’t suppose painting later roundels etc. would be much of a priority. The picture of the aircraft at Vis with the thin white stripe in the fin flash but a NOVJ roundel is a case in point, somehow.

Rob / Kansan

PS I hesitate to say this (because it may show my profund ignorance), but is that an ex-RAF fin flash in which case shouldn’t the red stripe be at the front and the blue stripe be at the fin/rudder joint?

Mark,

It is so called “soft Dj” pronounced like first letter of Juliet. That is not same letter as described “hard Dz” in Jazz and Jam.

Croatian alphabet do not have letters Q, W, X, Y but have few specific letters (among 30 of them) such is Č (hard Ch), Ć (soft Ch), Đ (soft J), Dž (hard J), Lj (pronounced similar as first vocal of liana), Nj (new) and Ž (I cant find any word in English which is pronounced like that). Of course if you want to see those letters right – you must set your IE for Central European encoding 😀

Regards
JeT

P.S. I must confirm again there is only two guys who find this interesting. Sorry Kansan 😉

Thanks for that JeT,

Are you sure your site counter is working because I have looked at it four times?

It is hard to imagine that with over 1250 hits on this thread, only two people have taken a peek at an exciting Spitfire site.

http://www.yuairwar.com/novj.asp

Mark

Mark,

It is so called “soft Dj” pronounced like first letter of Juliet. That is not same letter as described “hard Dz” in Jazz and Jam.

Croatian alphabet do not have letters Q, W, X, Y but have few specific letters (among 30 of them) such is Č (hard Ch), Ć (soft Ch), Đ (soft J), Dž (hard J), Lj (pronounced similar as first vocal of liana), Nj (new) and Ž (I cant find any word in English which is pronounced like that). Of course if you want to see those letters right – you must set your IE for Central European encoding 😀

Regards
JeT

P.S. I must confirm again there is only two guys who find this interesting. Sorry Kansan 😉

Jet,

A very interesting code letter on the Spitfire side profile.

We in the UK ( and the colonies) see this as a ‘D’ with a line through the vertical, whereas I gather, and I might be wrong, it is actually a combined ‘D’ and a ‘Z’, like a ‘hard J’ as in jam and jazz.

If not please clarify. Thanks.

Mark

I almost foreget…

NDH (Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska) Independent State of Croatia; Axis puppet state, roughly covering most of today’s Croatia, the whole Bosnia-Herzegovina and a part of Vojvodina

NOVJ (Narodnooslobodilacka vojska Jugoslavije) National Liberation Army of Yugoslavia, the other designation for the NOV (the Communist-led resistance army)

NOV i POJ (Narodnooslobodilacka vojska i partizanski odredi Jugoslavije) National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Yugoslavia, the official designation of the volunteer resistance force following the creation of the first divisions and corps in November 1942; but before that was PO i DVJ (Partizanski odredi i dobrovoljačka vojska Jugoslavije); on 1st March 1945 renamed into JA (Yugoslav Army)

Maybe I should not be so conclusive. It immediately finishes the discussion 😉

Otherwise what is your opinion about former NDH and latter NOVJ Liaison Sqd bird – Fiat G.50 bis i.e. who today (of all former Yugoslav republics) have right to keep it as part of its national history?

If some discussants from Serbia see my question – this could be hot one 😀

😀

Maybe Kansan… but in this case it is very small possibility.

Probably tail section was used from some crash-landed R.A.F. Spitfire and still wasn’t painted in Partisan markings. You can see different camouflage pattern used on fin/stabiliser and ruder/elevator surfaces. So it obviously wasn’t painted yet.

The cooperation between the NOVJ and Anglo-American Allies, which officially started in May 1943, was continued and, already in the second Allied Conference held in Quebeck on August 24, 1943, the decision was brought on the future allied support to the Partisans in terms of weapons and equipment. The turning point in the allied relation towards the NOVJ happened after the tripartite meeting Roosevelt-Stalin-Churchill in Teheran held from November 28 to December 01, 1943 when they brought the decision on recognition of the NOVJ as an Allied Force, as well as on further allied support to the Partisan movement in Yugoslavia. Passing through Cairo after the Teheran conference, Churchill met Brigadier Fitzroy Maclean who was Head of the Anglo-American Military Mission at the Vrhovni štab NOV and POJ (and also Churchill’s personal emissary) since September 1943. Obtaining thorough information about the situation in Yugoslavia, Churchill gave a green light to the continuation of co-operation. Accordingly what happened in December was the continuation of negotiations of Partisan general Velebit in the Middle East Command with General Henry Maitland Wilson (CinC Middle East), Air Marshal William Sholto Douglas (RAF CinC Middle East) and Admiral Willis. The consequence of these negotiations was a re-basement of the NOVJ 1st Air Force Base to Italy.

On February 01, 1944 the Middle East Command issued order on the formation of the Yugoslav Squadrons. Consequently, negotiations in the NOVJ Supreme Command (Vrhovni štab) were continued between Maršal Tito and the Head of Air Force Department, pukovnik Franc Pirc with the Commander of Allied Military Mission, Brigadier Fitzroy Maclean and R.A.F. liaison officer, Wing Commander John Selby. On March 12, 1944 it resulted in Tito and Maclean’s signatures of the “Protocol on Training Yugoslav Pilots and Other Air Force Personnel as well as the Formation of Yugoslav Fighter and Bomber Squadrons within the R.A.F.”.

Some of the most significant regulations of that Contract were as follows:

– To immediately identify the most skilful pilots and necessary professional personnel among the gathered ones who will be the first to be taken into consideration for the formation of fighter squadron, while other personnel will be allocated on different trainings according to their qualifications and skills.
– Skilled pilots and professional personnel of the former Royal Air Force residing in the Middle East, upon joining the personnel for the Squadron formation, should be posted to basic staff and training duties, for other pilots and auxiliary personnel.
– Pilots incapable of running pilot-fighters and capable of running bombers will be sent to bomber training, and after the completion of simultaneous training for other personnel (observers, radio-telegraphists, machine-gunners), entire bomber crews will be formed from among them.
– According to Maršal Tito’s request, pilots who are not operatively competent will be trained as liaison pilots for special Yugoslav needs and they will, after the completion of their training, be allocated in the Supreme Command Liaison Squadron (Eskadrila za vezu VŠ).
– Pilots who need longer training will be subsequently allocated in the squadron as soon as they have completed their training.
– As soon as the newly-formed squadron is ready for independent action, it will be assigned to one of R.A.F.’s Wings and will always be allocated to an airport from which its activities are to be aimed at targets in Yugoslavia. The squadron will administratively and operatively be subordinated to R.A.F., but with missions assigned preferably over the territory of Yugoslavia.
– Operative requests of the VŠ NOV i POJ will be proceeded via R.A.F. Command that will be in charge of assigning squadron missions.
– After the squadron is organised, all personnel will wear the prescribed Yugoslav uniforms and aircraft will be marked with a “Red star” within the standard British marking on aircraft.
– Complete material and technical supply and fulfilment of all other needs for the Yugoslav squadron will be the same as for other R.A.F. squadrons.
– The Yugoslav squadron personnel takes an oath only to Maršal Tito and Yugoslavia, but appropriate agreement should be made by the Supreme R.A.F. Command because the British Military Mission does not have such authority.

So No.352 Sqd Spits in action could look only like this:

In this case, I think it was option C)

But Mark can definitely describe it better in his native language 😉

JeT – your English is way better than my, errr…. :confused: – Anyway. your English is way better. 😀

What I mean is – I think I’ve seen pictures of OTHER Spitfires in foreign (non-British) service where the end-users had not erased the RAF fin flash, just like the picture you posted. Maybe the RAF fin flash was the least important part of the national marking.

Rob / Kansan

In this case, I think it was option C)

But Mark can definitely describe it better in his native language 😉

Mark,

According to replies it fascinate only two 🙁

For me more interested is combination of R.A.F. markings on fin with Partisan insignia on fuselage. Who knows… maybe she flew for some time in that insignia combination 😉

JeT

I thought it was fascinating too – honestly. 🙂

From what I remember of the various black and white pictures, I thought I saw a couple of Dutch, French, Norwegian (maybe) and USAAF Spitfires with the RAF fin flash still in place, although this may reflect a combination of (a) bad memory (b) misreading black and white photos (c) not representative of final paint scheme (d) some other error on my part. Would it be reasonable to assume that the RAF fin flash would indicate an “allied” connection (like the fin flash applied to B-24s in the MTO) while not suggesting RAF ownership?

Rob / Kansan

…and forget to mention how second Spitfire (look right) have unusual colour contrast for usual Mediterranean (grey-green) camouflage. So there is great possibility she has applied Desert (sand-brown) camouflage.

That is also very unusual for theatre of operation.

JeT

Mark,

Many thanks for that. Fascinating stuff.

According to replies it fascinate only two 🙁

Now if we could get the ‘Merlins over Malta’ duo to swing by the Vis reunion on their outward or return journey up the ‘leg’ of Italy, a short hop across the Adriatic, it would certainly get a few hearts racing, apart from the pilot’s…

…only joking Glenn.

Why not? You need just few good men on right position. Maybe someone could contact that Veteran Association ad suggest it.

That photo on Vis is particularly interesting. A tropical filter Spitfire Mk V but fitted with an extended horn elevator and associate tailplanes from a Mk IX. A replacement or fitted from new?

For me more interested is combination of R.A.F. markings on fin with Partisan insignia on fuselage. Who knows… maybe she flew for some time in that insignia combination 😉

JeT

Vis

Jet,

Many thanks for that. Fascinating stuff.

Now if we could get the ‘Merlins over Malta’ duo to swing by the Vis reunion on their outward or return journey up the ‘leg’ of Italy, a short hop across the Adriatic, it would certainly get a few hearts racing, apart from the pilot’s…

…only joking Glenn.

That photo on Vis is particularly interesting. A tropical filter Spitfire Mk V but fitted with an extended horn elevator and associate tailplanes from a Mk IX. A replacement or fitted from new?

Whilst very early Mk IX’s still carried the Mk V type elevator/tailplanes, I suspect the transition of this improvement/modification was more blurred within the Supermarine and Vickers separate organisations than first thought.

Mark

Vis appron