From Facebook;
The Kent Battle of Britain Museum Trust at Hawkinge displays many aircraft of the types flown during the Battle of Britain including Hurricanes, Spitfires, Messerschmitt Bf 109Es, Defiant, Harvard, Tiger Moth and Magister. Due to the rarity of original Battle of Britain aircraft, let alone their value, the Hurricanes, Spitfires, Messerschmitt Bf 109s and Defiant are mostly replicas but are heavily rebuilt using many original parts.
One aircraft missing from our line-up of Royal Air Force Fighter Command machines of the Battle of Britain period is the Bristol Blenheim. To show its importance, of the 2938 airmen awarded the clasp and therefore classed as one of ‘The Few’ nearly 800 flew in Blenheims during the Battle of Britain period. The Blenheim was flown not only with Fighter Command but also Bomber, Coastal and Training Commands during 1940. In 1937 it became the RAF’s first all-metal monocoque monoplane and was the fastest aircraft on the inventory. It remained as the Service’s fastest bomber at the outbreak of the Second World War.
Therefore, the Volunteers at the Kent Battle of Britain Museum Trust are very pleased and extremely excited to announce that we have acquired one! Well actually the substantial remains of four Bristol Bollingbrokes (Canada built Blenheims) that will be rebuilt into one original airframe displayed as a Bristol Blenheim Mk. IV.
The vast majority of this Blenheim project, including a fuselage, centre section and a pair of wings should be arriving as early as next week at the Museum and when we have arranged the necessary transport. The cockpit section will be arriving from Canada in a few months and at a date to be confirmed.
This will be the end of a nearly forty-year quest by the Museum Chairman, Dave Brocklehurst MBE, to bring a Blenheim back to former RAF Hawkinge Airfield, an airfield they operated out of during 1940. Dave would often ‘bicker’ with Mike Llewellyn MBE, the late Founder and Curator of the Museum, that one day we would have a Boulton Paul Defiant and a Bristol Blenheim on display. Mike said this would never happen! As many of you already know, we acquired the beautiful Boulton Paul Defiant replica, built by the Boulton Paul Association, in February 2015. Well we hope that Mike is looking down from where ever he might be, to see that the promise Dave made to him is coming to fruition.
The project we have acquired is the left-over parts from the gorgeous Bristol Blenheim Mk. I (the short nose version) that has been rebuilt and flown by Aircraft Restorations Co at Duxford. The Trustees and Volunteers at the Museum would like to extend their sincere thanks to John Romain, James Gilmour and all the team at Aircraft Restorations Co who have been instrumental in bringing our dreams to reality.
We will shortly be launching an Appeal to help fund the purchase and rebuild of this rare and outstanding aircraft. In the meantime, if you can help in anyway, please let us know.
Please ‘like’ and ‘share’
Thank you…
By: RAFRochford - 12th December 2017 at 14:03
Meddle;
Happy to split the winnings! (What did we win??)
Would you be a fellow Numanoid by any chance?
By: Arabella-Cox - 12th December 2017 at 11:28
It’s perhaps still a bit early in the season of ever hoped-for peace and goodwill, however, I’d like to take a moment now to wish our band of moderators all a very Happy Christmas after another year’s tireless moderation. I’ve not always agreed with all of you, but your efforts are always appreciated. And a Happy Christmas too to all those other members making interesting posts while managing to keep it civil.
Seconded……..!!!
By: Moggy C - 12th December 2017 at 09:19
I’d like to wish our band of moderators all a very Happy Christmas after another year’s tireless moderation.
Many thanks. Your appreciation is… er… appreciated 😀
Moggy
By: Arabella-Cox - 11th December 2017 at 23:15
Wow! Cameras allowed inside, what a coup!
Really…………?? You mean this museum is joining the rest of us in the 21st Century and realising people take pictures … wow ?!!!
By: Meddle - 11th December 2017 at 19:52
“…doing something rather than anonymously criticizing others from the internet sideline.”
Something of a favorite contrived platitude on this forum at the moment, and not one that becomes any more profound with repetition. At the risk of running counter to the groupthink that pervades this forum at times, I will be using said contrived platitude any time anybody criticises the changes at Hendon. :applause:
Lets see your RAF history museum, before you criticise theirs, etc ad nauseum.
By: J Boyle - 11th December 2017 at 19:35
Nice to see them taking on a large project, doing something rather than anonymously criticizing others from the internet sideline.
By: Meddle - 11th December 2017 at 19:14
The track Partridge is air bass’ing to is Music for Chameleons by Gary Numan, a keen flyer who was part of the Harvard Display Team; often piloting Harvard G-AZSC as painted to represent a Zero.
The cheque is in the post? :angel:
EDIT: Doh! RAFRochford got there first. We can split the winnings?
By: RAFRochford - 11th December 2017 at 13:18
That would be the pale musical android and the equally pale coloured vintage trainer then…possibly…just clutching at straws perhaps?
By: Trolly Aux - 11th December 2017 at 12:03
Spot the aviation connection Medds
By: Meddle - 10th December 2017 at 18:02
The opening of that video has something very Alan Partridge about it, and I agree that the editing is a bit bewildering.
By: jeepman - 10th December 2017 at 17:09
Nice to see the Fordson WOT1 6×4 ambulance in the background but as a fully Coded member of the colour police, it is in post war colours……..
By: Beermat - 10th December 2017 at 16:57
Yes, but why do TV reports of any kind insist on mangling things? Flown by The Few, the Blenheim was the fastest thing in the RAF in September 39? Then there is that bizarre interview sound edit about having a Blenheim, and now a Blenheim too.. and I suspect victory was far from ensured in 1940.
A fantastic initiative by the Hawkinge team.
By: Piston - 10th December 2017 at 15:09
Wow! Cameras allowed inside, what a coup!
By: hawker1966 - 10th December 2017 at 14:18
A great article and very well put together, thank you for sharing ErollC
Also thanks for the news clip Trolly Aux
The Blenheim/Bollingbroke project is certainly creating some interest and rightly so well done once again to the Kent Battle of Britain museum at Hawkinge..
By: Trolly Aux - 10th December 2017 at 14:05
By: ErrolC - 10th December 2017 at 09:55
Photos from Saturday at Warbird Tails
https://warbirdtails.net/2017/12/10/blenheim-project-arrives-at-hawkinge/
By: WV-903. - 3rd December 2017 at 01:32
That is very good news, well done all at Hawkinge Aircraft Restorations and Canadian enthusiasts.
My father was a ground RAF Airman (LAC ) Engine mechanic in the Battle of France. He very rarely wished to speak about it, but he did once point out to me that a picture on the front cover of a:- “War Illustrated” magazine that showed 3 Sgt. airmen in the C/pit of a Blenheim looking down at the Camera ( Pic was taken looking up thru entrance hatch ) Were all pals of his out there and they all died in the battle. I could tell it affected him a lot. This was in early 1950’s, about the time the “War in The Air ” TV Series came out on BBC TV. Watching this with him once, he jumped up out of his chair and Said” ” Good G*** !! That’s the Tiger Moth that brought our mail in”. referring to the clip of one landing during the battle. My father made it to Dunkirk and got out on a Brit Destroyer. That’s all I know about his BoF time. He died in 1981, 67 yrs of age. It’s too late now to get his memories back and history needs to be preserved wherever it can be done.
Full marks again to all concerned.
Bill T.
By: Aviart - 2nd December 2017 at 12:30
Is it any different than taking the mangled and decayed wreck of a Bf109E. Refabricating 99.999999% of the entire airframe to varying degrees of accuracy and claiming it’s an original period Battle of Britain Bf109E…
By: FiltonFlyer - 2nd December 2017 at 12:18
Interesting discussion about the differences between Blenheims and Bolingbrokes. Although Bolingbroke was the original name, the Canadians kept that name and the RAF changed its name to the Blenheim Mk.IV. Fairchild then developed the aircraft, Mks I, II, III, IV and IV-T, so that were external differences between the types. Two I can think of were the window in the side of the rear fuselage and larger rear nacelle to hold a dinghy. Both of the earlier Duxford flying examples were Bolingbrokes painted as Blenheims, but the latest incarnation is certainly all Blenheim, as the Bolingbroke-specific features have been removed in the process if turning it into a Blenheim Mk.I. It is still registered as a Bolingbroke Mk.IV though. It would have been a bit of a hybrid otherwise.
I’d be happy if the finished Kent example was a Bolingbroke painted as a Blenheim, or any combination, it will be great to have another one on display. That 2011 Flypast article was one of the reasons I took down my website, I got fed up with it being copied verbatim without credit.
Andrew
By: Mothminor - 2nd December 2017 at 10:40
Published in Flypast January 2011 –
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November 30, 2017 at 6:58 pm