It surely doesn’t matter how many Gannets were built, since each would have had one of these anyway – remember the fact that the stores would have had several ready in case they were needed so, at the time, they would be less rare than the aircraft they would be fitted to.

As it is I’m trying to remember where I saw several of different designs and/or colour schemes, and most appeared to be in unissued condition, about ten or twelve years ago. Somewhere in the Midlands, I think.

Confused more by what is new about any of this?

No. I was referring to the fact that apparently they had removed most ‘original parts’ – presumably for spares or whatever – prior to it being heaved into the pond yet left a table seemingly marked with the serial and the names of the crew on a specific flight several years before it was DBR’d written in grease pencil.
Rather convenient for their story that the serial was there (to prove their point, I suppose) and strange that the crew names for a flight five-odd years previous hadn’t been wiped out, deliberately or accidentally.

Looks like a tree with flowers on…(if this link works)

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.320089,-0.8678453,3a,15y,323.72h,83.68t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sIbisZyup8L1XxGhdAAVo7w!2e0

The expectation at the time was that the natives would torture any captives since the bodies of previous captives were usually found naked and mutilated, hence the troopers would be eager to go as ‘painlessly’ as possible. But they didn’t notice that the bodies of those killed before capture were also stripped and mutilated – a tradition reserved for the dead: native Americans usually killed any captives immediately (to the point that there might even be a fight for the honour to do it; the sounds of intermittent gunfire heard by the surviving soldiers after they knew Custer and his men were defeated were the coup de grâce being dealt out prior to scalping) unless they were children (who were adopted) or young women (who were ‘adopted’ and eventually married into the tribe), stripped them and then mutilated the body so that it would not be happy in the ‘happy hunting ground’. The myth of torture has been perpetuated by most western’s – at least until they stopped being so one sided.

Apparently Custer’s ear drums were pierced so that he could hear better in the afterlife, because he hadn’t been listening to the natives when he’d been alive…

No, Hampy. (See below)

is it asking too much for the film producers to, at least, get the history right and not deviate into flights-of-fantasy just because they believe it is more entertaining?

It won’t sell seats that way; usually make do is much cheaper and keeps the accountants happy. And anyway, history can be…influenced by a film:

While visiting Bletchley Park I have clearly overheard visitors telling each other that the anels explaining the first capture of Enigma machines are incorrect, because BP displays say it was RN personnel who captured it first, but the visitors ‘know‘ it was first captured by USN because they ‘remember seeing it “on TV” somewhere…‘ And I’ve heard that sort of comment from both Brits and Americans looking at the display

First captured by the RN, yes, but it was actually on sale – for both commercial and military use – from 1923 onwards, and the Poles had broken the encryption as early as 1932.

Yes I did realise that, having seen both movies 🙂

Both movies?

At the battlefield the locations of where men fell are marked (the bodies are buried elsewhere, even then the Army sent remains home to be buried.

Well, it was only officers bodies that were sent home (or more likely Fort Leavenworth) at the time – unless you were part of the Custer clan (two of his brothers, one a civilian, a civilian nephew and a brother-in-law died with him) or your family was prepared to take the body away without utilising military resources. The bodies were initially buried where they fell (1879) and later (1881) reburied in the on site cemetery – stakes were left in the ground to denote where the bodies had been and these were later replaced with the current markers (1890). More recently (1999 onwards) markers have been placed to indicate where native American warriors fell.

BTW – fascinating fact that most of the world believes Custer and all the men of the 7th Cavalry were massacred at Little Big Horn; just the men who rode with him died, another battalion followed behind, scouting further along the valley from where they had come whilst a company escorted the supply wagons but both arrived too late to assist him, whilst his 2ic’s battalion was meant to ride into the camp to rout the natives but either encountered a lot of resistance and retreated or (if you believe Custer’s wife) the coward in charge left Custer to die by not trying to push through the middle of the attacking warriors to help him. Either way the cavalry had initially been split into three distinct battalions and only one battalion – Custer’s – was completely wiped out (except for one native scout and one horse – Comanche – although other horses could have been taken by the victorious warriors). That is not to say that those two surviving battalions had it easy – they joined up and (with the wagon train and its escort) were apparently under siege for another day before relief arrived, but then what do you expect when you try to ambush a camp where (unbeknown to them) a mass pow-wow of various tribes was being held?
Incidentally, did this documentary mention that a large number of those who died alongside Custer apparently took their own lives rather than be captured? This information was known about – the native Americans never kept it secret – but it took 100 years before a history book came out and made it ‘official’, and even then that information had been essentially suppressed (apparently at the request of the government) for over 40 years due to the unpopular idea that US Cavalrymen would commit suicide in action.

(Had to do some background research into an Englishman who died in the battle…)

There’s this one http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?132562-Virgin-Galactic-spaceship-crashes-during-California-test-flight

Rats. Ok, I admit I’m the idiot who clicked on Trip Reports by acciddent… It was the next one down from Commercial, I tell you!