The Spitfires.
Apart from the four Spitfires (and two Hurricanes) of the BBMF, there were a further seventeen Spitfires and Seafires, of various Marks, which displayed, in pairs, and in a mass formation and a re-creation of a 'scramble'. Many of these saw action in World War 2, and some have victory claims.
In my next few posts here, I'll try to illustrate each one, with a brief history of each where known.
To start off, I'll begin with the Mark 1's.
Spitfire Mk1, N3200.
Possibly the most amazing example on display, N3200 was built in 1939, and is one of only two Mark 1's restored to complete, authentic, period condition (the other being P9374).
It arrived on 19 Squadron, at RAF Duxford, on 19th April, 1940. During the Dunkirk evacuation, N3200 flew it's first, and only, operational sortie when, on the morning of the 26th, Sqn. Ldr. Geoffrey Stephenson flew it, leading an Offensive Patrol over the Dunkirk beaches, where they ran into 21 Ju87s, escorted by 30 Me 109s. After shooting down a Ju-87, Stephenson was himself shot down, and crash-landed on the beach at Sangatte, near Calais.
P/O Watson also failed to return from this patrol.
Stephenson was captured, and spent the rest of the war as a PoW, including being incarcerated in Colditz castle, where he was part of the team that designed the famous Colditz glider.
The Spitfire gradually sank under the sand on Sangatte beach, until, in the early 1980's, with the shifting sands, she began to re-appear, and was eventually recovered in 1986, and later returned to the UK.
From 2007, she was painstakingly restored to original condition by Historic Flying Limited, and the Aircraft Restoration Company at Duxford, her original base, and made her first post-restoration flight, at Duxford, on 26th March, 2014.
On 9th July, 2015, it's American owner Thomas Kaplan, very generously donated the Spitfire to the Imperial War Museum, Duxford, where she now wears her original markings, plus the IWM logo and the name 'Duxford', on her nose, in the style later adopted, by 19 Sqn, on 'presentation' Spitfires.