Have just come across this entertaining thread. Here is my contribution, an NF13 in its natural habitat, guarding the Suez Canal, LOL

*Tries to imagine how a D-Day-striped USAAF C47 would fit into the Dambusters re-make…and fails* 🙂

Surely they would need something to transport the Tallboys from the American inventor and manufacturer.

I can see from my pic that it also shows the SHUT and OPEN markings. A great pity I did not have my current little digital camera instead of the 120 rollfilm Agfa I had then. F4.5 and 3 speeds, focus by guesswork and exposure by God.
If people would like a little piece about aerial gunnery in those days, we did plenty and it was great fun, just say.

Having watched from our garden various fighters chasing, and shooting at, Doodlebugs, I well remember the original cruise missile. Some were easier to catch than others, the crude engines possibly varied in power. the worst incident I remember was seeing a Mustang diving on one which was headed straight over us. He did not quite have the speed and fired in desperation, I suddenly realised that the rustling noise I heard was his bullets going through the hedge behind us.

I guess many airfields which were used during the war will have many small arms rounds lying just below the surface. When aircraft were rearmed in wet weather and odd rounds or short lengths of belted ammo were cleared they dropped in the mud and disappeared. I can remember when the housing was built on Martlesham Heath in the ’70s and ’80s, there were several stoppages of work to clear quite large quantities of just such ammo.
As an aside, when I was a boy during the war the soldiers were happy to give us their blank 303s to save fouling their rifle barrels. We also acquired a considerable amount of live ammo of various calibres both English and German. I well remember disposing of some 300 rounds by lighting a big fire in a slit trench, and pitching the ammo in and diving into another slit trench which the Army had conveniently dug close by. Petrol anyone? We used to collect it by the pint from discarded 4 gallon tins the Army used to refuel their tanks. Second vehicle I ever drove, age about 9, was a Churchill tank.

The lack of honours demonstrates just what mean minded politicians we have had in charge over the last 50 years.
Now of course none of the party heirarchy has seen action and very few have even done a “proper” job, much less served in the Forces.
I despair for the future of this country, my lowly 8 years was wasted.