Dave HomewoodBrilliant story Jules, thanks for sharing that adventure.
What did the ground officer think??
Dave HomewoodAre the Stuka and Spitfire at Chicago still hung from the ceiling like that? It doesn’t seem to be a very practical way to display them.
Dave HomewoodLovely photos as usual Alex, thanks for posting them.
What is the nationality markings of that Provost? I haven’t seen roundels like that before.
Dave HomewoodIs Len Deighton’s book ‘Battle of Britain’ very good or is it too supposedly dodgy on facts? I read that years ago and learned a lot from it. I’d hate to think what I learned was wrong.
This may or may not apply here, I don’t know as I haven’t read Fighter. But I always find it interesting how one or two books on a subject can set up facts in people’s minds seemingly set like concrete, and then another book with different facts may make all those people say instantly – “It’s wrong, it’s rubbish, he’s talking crap.” And yet that author may have researched just as hard and uncovered the facts from a different point of view, a different angle, and as everybody has a subjectivity that is unique, they will tell ‘their’ truth to the researcher. But as ‘their’ truth differs from the original truth, that have now become ‘fact’, they’re shouted down as wrong. Do you see what I mean. No book can ever be definitive, nor can any documentary or dramtic recreation of events. They are merely one view of looking at the set of facts, with some views of the truth prominent and some omitted. Everything is subjective, and because it is different doesn’t mean it isn’t true. It is working out which truth most fits you that matters. Like the recent debate over flour bombs being dropped as practice. It is a truth, but one that the majority hadn’t heard of through ‘their’ books, so it was not considered true. See what I mean?
Of course, there are also books utterly full of bullshine too! But that is another matter.
I am looking forward to seeing your critique Andy, and the rebuttals if any come. We shall all probbaly learn some interesting new angles on the Battle of Britain. Cheers.
Dave HomewoodSorry Steve, I have been trained to study and disect films. Sometimes it can be a pain I guess.
Sure, it is just a movie, and a very, very good one. I’m not knocking it. I just thought it really odd, especially because when it was released hundreds of thousands of veterans would have gone “Hey, that’s one of ours shooting at them”. I doubt they’d have fooled too many people when it was released. Has no-one else here picked up on this? I’d heard so much good feedback about the film and I have to agree, it is brilliant.
I loved the film, and Command Decision too. I just want to know if there are any more like it.
Incidentally in Roger A. Freeman’s excellent video Over Here he says the opening shot where the veteran returns to the runway was shot in the USA. I assume the whole film was made on a US base then? Or was some of it made in the UK?
Dave HomewoodJust an alert, an episode of the Al Read Show can be heard at the moment on BBC7 Listen Again here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbc7/listenagain/saturday/
It is the first show under the programme called Comedy Controllers
Dave HomewoodThere were RNZAF personnel in almost every RAF squadron in the war, so many RNZAF men served in the African campaign, but the only actual RNZAF unit that served there was No. 490 (NZ) Sqn which was only in East Africa, with Catalinas and later Sunderlands
Dave HomewoodI know someone who was at that show. It was very convincing he said. There was a different photo of TB863 in the scheme in New Zealand Wings magazine when they did a full feature on its history in about 1990/91.
Dave HomewoodThat Mosquito looks superb, well done the IWM team. A very, very nice paint job.
It is an interesting scheme and is certainly different from any other Mossie preserved around the world.
Congrats for also remembering the target tug pilots. My great-uncle was shot down by an American Corsair while towing a target in a Harvard in WWII. He survived but I wonder how many target tug pilots have lost their lives.
Dave HomewoodDave. That is of course a personal view which you are entitled to have.
Were you to see a container at an airfield near to you which was stuffed with toys destined for us, of course we should be interested. The fact that the a/c in the box at DX is headed stateside, or any other boxes in Scandinavia or at North Weald aren’t headed your way you say so what.
If you don’t benefit from the info in a thread you may chose not to read it. But as this thread was intended to be a little bit of fun drawing the usual speculation, I see no reason for you to put a downer on it simply because it has no relevance to you.
Of course you can make whatever comments you choose.
My view is that a crate on an airfield that is open to entry fee paying public is fair game. If you have paid to see things and you see them you are happy. Where businesses are operating and do not wish the public to see what is going on they take active measures. Commercial operations that have secrets do not put them on public display accidentally. However we are sensitive to some activities at DX where contratcs are operating with commercial restrictions. But then the public generally know little or nothing about them.
Hey Merlin,
Perhaps my hasty choice of words has been taken the wrong way. I wasn’t trying to put a downer on the thread. Far from it. I wasn’t saying “I don’t benefit from the thread so therefore I must put a stop to it.” :confused:
If I was only interested in stuff that was coming to or happening in NZ I wouldn’t bother with this forum as there is so little traffic of warbirds to this country. I am interested in the UK scene as much as the NZ scene.
I have been as amused as you by some of the playful suggestions on here – I made one myself. And with this post I was attempting to make a more serious one, which I feel is valid. Maybe they are making space?
I was also merely saying that whether it is going in or out of Duxford I won’t have the privilege of seeing it so it makes no difference to me, but I’ll punt an idea anyway – which I did.
I am not saying that the speculation on here is not amusing and interesting at all. I love it.
On the other hand I feel Snapper has a point about commercial sensitivty. Maybe it is not valid in this case, I don’t know. But people have to rememebr that while Duxford is a museum it is also a place of several businesses. We have to respect the operators too. A few months ago a thread on here mentioned some public movements of newly arrived trainer aircraft at Duxford and a certain operator got very upset by all the talk on the forum.
And in a way wanting to know what is in a locked container at DX is the same as wanting to know what’s behind a locked door at Hendon, or the Louvre or in any other public museum. And whilst it is greatfun to specualte what might be behind that locked door, someone there may not want you to know, so care should be taken. that’s all.
A little banter is fine and long may it continue. If I offended you or anyone else, I apologise, I did not mean to.
And as far as I go, to be honest, there were a container at an airfield or museum round here I’d more than likely walk past without noticing it! It would never occur to me something interesting may be inside. I guess I am just blaze’ like that.
Dave HomewoodOzplane,
It doesn’t come down to who is going to defend NZ. That is not the argument at all. You are talking about a slim hyperthetical situation of NZ being invaded. What has that to do with anything?? Absolutely nothing.
I am talking about a reality that has occurred. Countries like Nigeria and Fiji have been expelled in the past from the British Commonwealth for much less atrocities. Countries can be expelled from the UN too. Before the first Gulf War the USA had not paid its UN subs for ten years. It paid all its back dues in one lump to get the UN on side in 1990. Funnily enough once the war was over they stopped paying again, till just around September 2001. Most other countries pay their’s when asked. You cannot have UN missions without money and you should not be able to pick and choose when you want to pay, and when you want to listen to the majority. The whole spirit of the United Nations is to achieve peace through uniting nations. Not by doing what you want if it suits you and no-one else. I just see it as one law for most countries and another law for the select few who think they rule the roost politically.
As Steve Patterson has said though, talking politics is very boring. let’s get back to aircraft.
Dave HomewoodI don’t know if the Government was involved in this actually Chris. They may have been, but I know it was mainly the NZ Fighter Pilots Association (driven by Bryan himself I think) and Motat who got it going. I know this because one of Motat’s curators, Bill Rayner, was telling me about their plans when I visited there last May. He was apologising for his lateness in meeting me because he had been talking with Frank Keefe’s wife and some others who’d come in to see if they’d put up the memorial.
I doubt the Government knows where Green Island was. It was one of our major bases in the latter stages of the war. It was captured by the NZ Army and an RNZAF station was set up for Corsairs, and I think Catalinas and Venturas operated from there too from memory.
Dave HomewoodPersonally I don’t really care what is in these containers as I’ll never see them, and they are really none of our business. But I do wonder if perhaps because the IWM is having a massive change around in their hangars if perhaps some non-active items are being temporarily removed from hangars to give extra storage space to planes that need it?
Dave HomewoodActually thinking about it, what Teletext said “the air forces’s largest single day loss in the Pacific in World War Two” is only referring to loss in terms of numbers of aircraft.
On the 5th of December 1944 two Hudsons – NZ2044 and NZ2066 – disappeared after possibly colliding. 14 men were lost in that one event.
There were also other incidents where large numbers were lost – the crash of Dakota NZ3526 on the 24th of September 1945 saw 20 men lost. This was admittedly after the war finished but thery were on their way home to NZ from Santos.
Also on the 5th of June 1943, Catalina NZ4006 crashed into the sea between Fiji and NZ killing 15 people. And Catalina NZ4022 crashed on the 27th of Jan 1945 near Ubenga Island killing 12 people. So the Corsair event is by no means the single largest loss of life in a day.
I just realised, I have an equipment box from a Catalina that my Dad sourced somewhere years ago. It is marked with the code NZ2006. I knew it was a Catalina serial and obviously came from that aircraft, but I never realised that Catalina was lost without trace. Spooky.
Dave HomewoodPerhaps in reference to giving seven lives whilst trying to save an eighth?
I agree, it is a very strange thing to say though!
Imagine what it must have been like for the morale of the squadron. At that stage of the war they didn’t lose too many pilots very often. To lose half your pilots and eight aircraft in one day must have been quite devastating for both the pilots remaining and the ground crews. A whole bunch of replacements coming in would have changed the whole nature of the squadron.
It is interesting that later after the war Bryan did a lot of research into this event. When Keefe was captured he was held prisoner for a little while by the coast, and then he was to be taken away in a truck. Apparently a Japanese officer who spoke English had looked after him and when Keefe was being taken away he knew his fate, and he asked the officer to pray with him. Imagine that scene, a wounded Kiwi pilot, scared witless, in the jungle, saying Our Father with a Japanese officer. Bryan tracked down and met the officer after the war. The news said Keefe died of injuries but Bryan’s research found he was most probably murdered. The officer had said his wounds were not that bad.
I wholeheartedly recommend Too Young To Die by the way.
Sign In
