Hi Paul, can’t help I’m afraid, but interested in finding out what German/French Departments you will need to contact for WWII crashed allied aircraft…

Stuart

You may find some independent researc has been done on Google.fr There were no French records kept at that time, everything had been under German control and a lot of informastion hastily burnt at the end of WWII. The only hope is to find an indepedent over in France, who Is thinking along the same lines as yourself…..

Hi Ian

Is your address, Jersey-Guernsey? I had a chat with the curator of the Battle of Britain museum a couple of years ago, and he had been convinced that some U.S. dive team had come up with the wreckage of a Whirlwind off the coast there somewhere…..If this was a reliable source, can’t think of why it hasn’t made front page news…..

The peregrine had been at Tangmere,then there had been some kind of management altercation and the Peregrine went briefly to the Isle of Wight where Steve has a Spitfire restoration business, before going off again….on loan to Rolls Royce at Derby, apparently there are no plans to restore it. The supercharger housing is shattered, possibly the only feature that marks it out to be a Peregrine Rather than a Kestrel XXX, on the plus side though, it does have a bent airscrew….

sorry…..tyhat would be the coast off Jersey

[sorry omitted to tell you, that the report had been somewhere of the coast of Jersey…..There were in all quite a few possible Whirlwinds lost in this area anyway…..]Hi Jerry I know that you are over there and well I’m still here in Blighty, but the owner of the Battle of Britain museum in Hawkiinge, once told me ( a year or two ago, I would guess) that some divers, possibly from the U.S.A had found the outline of what appeared to be a wrecked Whirlwind off the coast somewhere, anyone you know with diving contacts over there?…..[/QUOTE]

J.P Coyne

J.P Coyne got a roasting from your uncle for the way in which he man handled a Whirlwind…….It would be interesting to hear the tape you have…..

I am a nephew of the late W/Cmdr Thomas P Pugh, DFC who served with 263 Squadron between June 1940 and February 1942 and as S/Ldr was Commanding Officer from August 1941.

Prompted by having recently made a good copy of the audio from a BBC recording from January 1942 on 78rpm 12” vinyl of Uncle Tom giving an account of a sortie to a German airfield in coastal France, for my father for Christmas, I have been doing some research on Uncle Tom.

Going through 263 Squadron records it appears that Uncle Tom flew Whirlwind P6994, among many others and in particular was the pilot who baled out of P6984 on 29 January 1941 due to double engine failure. For a short period when he was Squadron CO, P7116 was his “personal mount”. Whilst I haven’t made a full tally I note that others included P6977, 6990, 6995, 6996, 7004 and 7007.

My father has a few pictures of his brother but I would be really interested to know if you have any other images that might include Uncle Tom or the aircraft that he flew during his time with 263 Squadron and if you might be able to make any available. Uncle Tom is seated second row, fourth from the left (black sheepskin flying jacket) in the Squadron photo attached to one of your posts (I have a version of this photo).

Uncle Tom was later W/Cmdr with 182 Squadron operating Typhoons and was KIA on 2 August 1943 divebombing a destroyer in Dunkirk harbour. My father S/Ldr Robert M Pugh AFC RAF (Ret’d) flew Wellingtons with Coastal Command in particular with 38 Squadron in Libya in 1943. His other brother P/O John C Pugh was killed in a Spitfire crash in 1940.

It would certainly be great to be able to gather some images to accompany the copy I have made of the recording.

Thanks in anticipation.

Anthony[/QUOTE]

I f it is anything like the Dunmoore Moss Whirlwind, there will be one and a half Peregrines,the superchargers will be shattered….(the only bit a Peregrine that marks it out as being a Peregrine rather than a Kestrel XXX ) and the cannons, which tend to go in like darts and possible some wing structure , the vit behind the Nacelles,which is of heavy swg construction!

Browns aircraft was relatively intact when it came down on the 23rd january 1943…