Recent content by peter benn

Just noticed this. May be repub of 2014 article. Nicely written. https://www.vintagewings.ca/stories/the-maltese-falcons #SpitfireMkVc #HMSEagle #Screwball

Almost forgot: Malta Spitfire, by George Beurling, fairly typical WW2 prop, and One Man's Window, by Denis Barnham, who was in 601Sq (three were 249, 601, 185, different airfields) is simply amazing first person account in an artist's imaginative style. He appears to have psychic out of body...

Hello, relevant texts are: Earlier personal narrative: Wings of War, ed. Laddie Lucas Winged Victory, by Johnson and Lucas Hero, The Falcon of Malta, by Brian Nolan Furio Doglo Niclot, Un Pilota Indimenticabile, by Giovanni Massimelo, (Pacific Coast Models) Ital/Eng Then, after all RAF squadron...

Niclot-Doglio claimed WA Chuck Ramsay (249) July 11 over the Med. See Malta: The Spitfire Year 1942 (Shores/Cull) p 406 ff. Buerling may have done extra shift to look (? some indication in 1943 Malta Spitfire promo book). Buerling got Furio on 27 July. Eastern Canadians stuck together in those days.

"One Man's Window" by Denis Barnham? Malta-specific (601 Sqn? If memory serves) and he was a painter/illustrator with a belief in the supernatural. "Malta Spitfire" by George Beurling (1945) is rather breathlessly ghost-written in that Canadian propaganda style of the period, but it was a good...

There's a fair amount on 417 Squadron on Google Images, including 51 shots on pinterest (which I'm not a member of). But one of the links led to allspitfirepilots.org, and there's a bit there: Spitfire pilots and aircraft database - Flying Officer James E.R. Locke RCAF

And... that's early plastic sheeting, if that's what it is.

Whatever the location, the situation is interesting. Plastic over the engine might indicate the heads are off the Merlin. Two Erks on the prop indicate an attempt to move the engine... no danger of it starting, because presumably everything's been disconnected. Is it seized? Is the landing...

Just a conjecture, Ron, but weren't the Vc's launched from HMS Eagle stripped of m/g for fuel advantage? Just a memory of some reading here.... Beurling had plenty of opportunity to go over his guns with the air mechanics, and if there was any advantage to be gained (Summer '42) from...

Trackend, if you have the 429 log, is there any mention of a bomb aimer named Al or Pappy Stothart, 1943 to 1945? First in Wellingtons than Lancasters.

Regarding Hurricanes and Spitfires at Malta, three very good scholarly hardcovers are "Malta: the Hurricane Years" (Shores/Cull), "Malta: the Spitfire Year" (Shores/Cull), and "249 At War" (Cull). Most economically bought used on sites like abebooks, etc., these resources enable you to...

Sunny, is the second picture shot in Gibraltar or in Malta? The railway tracks and the crane load in are throwing me a little. Did Malta harbour have railway tracks? BR 22X might have arrived in April-May...

Denis Barnham hallucinated he was standing on the wing of his Spitfire, watching himself trying to tear his oxygen mask off. See "One Man's Window," Kimber 1956; NEL 1975.

Two things to consider: 1. A genuinely repossessed car at auction may have less wrong with it than a car offered for sale by an owner (Motive, or lack of), and; 2. In a middle-class apartment building (which could contain airline stewardesses, tech workers, salesmen, etc.) a car offered on...

Nice shots, Heinz. I won't touch the '58 Chev vs Tri-Five debate, but it is interesting to note (from letters to Collectible Automobile I remember) that the '58 had a loadable trunk for heavy items while the '59 didn't (bat wings). Pre-war Ford rods are very neat as well. The omitted bonnet...