Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Has anyone seen/read this book? Is it worth getting?

TIA

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Who is the author? Publisher? A quick search did not result in any hits for a book with precisely that name...

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Dilip Sarkar. Here's a link:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Spitfire-Ace...2484595&sr=1-1

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Darn, I missed that one! Those reviews sound promising, though with amazon "reviewers" one has to be ultra careful...

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Yes, you do have to be careful!

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

True, but Dilip certainly knows his subject. Has a long line of well-received books on the RAF (and the Battle Of Britain in particular) to his credit.

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Dilip Sarkar has written three books on Johnnie Johnson. The first two were a pair: Johnnie Johnson: Spitfire Top Gun, Part One and Part Two. Part One was published in 2002 by Ramrod Publications; Part Two was published in 2005 by Victory Books. Spitfire Ace of Aces, published last year by Amberley, is 312 pages long; Part One is 211 pages, Part Two is 234 pages. The page size of Ace of Aces is slightly larger than that of the other two books. Ace of Aces is basically a combined edition of Spitfire Top Gun, with some material deleted. In particular the photographs have been pruned back to those directly related to Johnson; page 172 of Top Gun Part Two has a photo of Chris LeRoux, and page 173 a photo of an overturned Tiger tank -- both gone. The text of Ace of Aces is usually exactly that of the two Top Gun books. Part Two ends in August 1944 when Johnson left operations; Ace of Aces has an additional chapter "Conclusion" 'A Marvelous Life'".

Conclusion: if you don't have the two volumes of Spitfire Top Gun, you will probably want Ace of Aces. I of course am a completist, so I have all three books. And no shelf space.

Enjoy!

Frank.

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Yep, I forgot to emphasize the latter issue...

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Thanks for all the comments. Looks like I'll have to order the book. Wing Leader was one of the first "war" books I ever read. Maybe Ace of Aces will explain why he made no claims for the last 7 months of the war?

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

Sorry to raise a thread from long ago, but I have just finished reading this book and to be honest I found it disappointing as a book to learn about Johnson the man. Reading through it my personal opinion was that it was very clinical and factual (obviously good!) but this outweighed the side that I was hoping would reveal more about who he really was, what motivated him, what his feeling were about the whole of the war, what his family thought of his escapades, etc, etc.

As I said, as a factual book it details in a very deliberate fashion events around the missions he flew but ultimately I didn't really feel I got to know much more about the 'Ace of Aces' other than what a statistician may offer, rather than a biographer?

Cheers, MP

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

There has always been one aspect about "Wing Leader" that I've never been able to understand. In the first editions, there are two separate stories that are deleted from later editions. It's in chapter 14, Normandy.
The first story has to do with one of the enemy leaders, a "well known veteran known by the un-Teutonic name of Matoni." Obviously a reference to Walter Matoni, who was the Staffel leader of 4./JG-26 throughout the Normandy campaign,
The second episode deals with capturing some SS cavalry horses and suffering a mortar attack.
In later editions, Chapter 14 is shortened by the removal of both accounts.

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

reappears FWIW (ie not much!) in 'Ace of Aces'

" In his log on 16 June 1944 Johnson wrote, 'Matoni and his 190s about'. He later recalled; " Yes, the Matoni thing was interesting. We had noticed this distinctive long-nosed 190 about, leading ordinary 190s and our spies confirmed the pilot to be an ace, Walter Matoni. We often saw him in the air but he could only be brought to battle if the circumstances were entirely favourable to him. His presence therefore became something of a challenge and I formed the habit of calling up Kenway and asking if Matoni was about. Challenging Matoni to a personal duel was, of course, rubbish. The subsequent newspaper reports put me in the firing line, not only for a lot of ribbing by the boys, but also an unexpected written bollocking from Paula (Johnson's wife) who reckoned that I was taking unnecessary risks.."

Doras in Normandy - there's a new myth started right there!. As 'mysticpuma' says (I think) I found 'AofA' a pretty dull book, Sarkar's 'Spitfire Voices' is far more interesting..

Re: Spitfire Ace of Aces
 

I found the book OK, but lacking information that I expected that was not in the 1950s edition of Wing Leader. Mainly why he made no claims late in 1944 or 1945 when he was obviously flying missions even in the last days of the war in Spitfire 14s?

I also read that Johnson rejected Priller's claim of 101 victories, but then did his own research and verified the vast majority of them. Is this true? May have been on the board before?