Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Dear members,

Does any one know the individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV, (K-version) in 1945 ???
He served with the 65.Sqdn.

In advance,thanks.

Warmest regards,
Jagdkommando

Re: SERIOUSLY HELP NEEDED !! PLEASE !!
 

And regarding the camouflage of this plane, any ideas or suggestion as to wether it was camouflaged or not? I am making a profile of it for Jagdkommando and would appreciate any input on this matter. It seems Mustangs IV were Silverbirds or camouflaged in a rather random manner.

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b3...V_Bradford.jpg

or

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b3...dford_kamo.jpg

?

Regards,

Kjetil Aakra

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Hi Guys

Nice profiles!

The indications are that Bradford’s a/c was YT*F but I do not have any more specific information about his a/c.

As you say the finish of RAF MkIVs in paint or NMF seems fairly random but the indications are that the very early serials delivered were more likely to be painted than NMF.

There seem to be very few photos of 65Sqn a/c from this period. There are two photos in “Mustang at War” by Roger Freeman. One of these photos shows a mixed group of NMF and painted a/c taxiing out for take off. None of the three painted a/c that can be picked out seem to have the white type identity markings; they all seem to have a light coloured spinner most likely to be Sky as was standard for ADGB. There is a photo around of YT*E crashed in Sweden which also seems to show the same markings/finish.

I don’t think there is any evidence that 65Sqn used red spinners on their Mustangs and I don’t think there is any evidence that RAF MkIVs were fitted with the rear view mirror.

Steve

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Hello,

Sdn Ldr Westrena's P51 III is shown in a photo "YT-J" the Spinner is dark in colour and is said to have been Red in colour. "J" had the normal camoflage with white nose band and sky aft fuselage band.

Andy Thomas did a good peice on 65 Sqdn in Scale Aircraft Modelling way back in 1988, perhaps he could add to this some further details.

In 1945 two of 65's Mustangs went down in Sweden,

YT-E, KH695 of F/L G.C.S. Pearson was in camoflage had sky spinner.
while the earlier crash was FZ110 "YT-S" of F/Sgt. R.T.Williams.

Other a/c were KH643 - YT-S
KH684 - YT-C; KH775 - YT-X; KM140 YT-E; KM314 YT-L.
All for now great profiles by the way like them.

Alex

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

The Mustangs would almost certainly have been delivered to the units with Sky spinners, but at some time coloured spinners were adopted to identify the units, presumably following 8th AF practice. I have never seen a proper listing of which units had which colour spinners, but I'd be reluctant to rule out the possibility of 65 Sq having red ones.

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Many thanks for your comments all. Much appreciated.

I'll check with my sources again regarding the red spinner. I have the photos to which you refer, Steve, as well as some of those photos mentioned by Alex. I think it will be best to use them as a basis for the profile.

YT-F is as good a suggestion as any, at least I know of no other contemporary 65th Sqd. Mustang with that code.

Would it be possible to see scans of the article on 65th Sqd you mentioned, Alex?

The rear view mirror will be deleted, as will the antenna as it seems RAF Msutangs used a mast-mounted VHF. And I've made stupid error with the rudder outline which will also be corrected. Should stick to my Bf 109s and Fw 190s and not doodle with these allied fighters!! :-)

Thanks again, all.

Kjetil Aakra

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Profiles have been updated slightly.

Kjetil Aakra

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Widespread practice among RAF Mustang Squadrons was the use of a red spinner by the S/L.Norwegian Mustang pilot,and later Wingco,Werner Christie said i started the practice while commanding 234 Sqn,but I have a feeling it had already been started by 234's previous commander.

Westenra's plane had a red spinner while C/O but when the plane was passed to Norwegian pilot Kristian Nyerrød the spinner was painted in another colour,possibly black.Unfortunately,Nyerrød could not remember what colour in an interview some 5-6 years ago.His memory was fading already at that time.

The Peterhead Wing had their Mustang Squadrons adopt a scheme incorporating several stripes.One of the Polish adopting red and white while 19 Sqn applied yellow and black.According to Dane "Ronnie" Rønhoff,the third squadron on the base was to have yellow and green stripes but this is unconfirmed.

Stein

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Apologies for the lack of precision in the wording of my earlier post. It was not my intention to state that 65Sqn Mustangs NEVER had red spinners. My comments were intended to make the point that as far as I know there is no evidence that 65Sqn Mustang IVs had red spinners when they were based at Peterhead.

Bradford was shot down on 11/4/45 and the discussion/profiles seemed to be about Mustang MkIVs and about operations from Peterhead. In the absence of photographs clearly it is wrong to rule out the possibility of any a/c having particular personal markings. However the photos in Roger Freeman's book were taken on 20/4/45 and the photo of ten a/c taxiing does not seem to show a single example of a dark coloured or red spinner they all seem to be either Sky or NMF.

It does seem to be the case that 65sqn and the other sqns of 122 Wing may have introduced red spinners (and retained the white nose band) on their Mustang IIIs when they were based at Funtington in May and June 1944. However there are a lot of photos of Mustang IIIs in the Polish sqns of 133 Wing from April 1944 onwards and none of those have coloured spinners and almost all of them show the full, white, type identity markings on spinner, nose, wings and tailplane. The photo of Westenra’s a/c FZ120/YT*J comes from the May 1944 period and the photos of FZ110/YT*S shows the a/c crashed in Denmark on 17/5/44. It is not clear whether red continued to be applied to spinners by 122 Wing during the invasion period and when they moved to ALGs in France. Available photos suggest that they had black spinners and the white nose band painted out (there are examples on the Australian War Memorial website).

There are photos of 65Sqn MkIVs in NMF from the post-war period when they returned South to Andrews Field that show a dark colour on the spinner and cockpit frame and this may be red.

Steve

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Hello Steve B,

You are correct, in my haste to respond I had overlooked the fact that Williams had inded come down in Denmark.

Williams did however escaped Denmark to Sweden and later to repatriation.

It seems that an escape hatch from one of his targets(Ju88's) had hit and lodged in the intake scoop holed the cooler causing overheat which brought about Williams's forced landing. [Making for Sweden pt 1 by Wegmann & Widfeldt]

Flt/Lt R. Barrett however was shot down and killed in FX993 by an Fw 190.
Thanks for correction.

Alex

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

It is my understanding that the first 30 Mustang IVs were delivered with camouflage, the remaining Mustang IVAs being in NM/silver finish. Camouflage was gradually removed during the service.
Red spinners were applied to 306 Sqn Mustangs, so I doubt if any other Squadron had such markings as well. I am wondering, was not 19 Sqn supposed to have white-blue spinners instead? Ah, 316 Sqn (white-red) was never at Peterhead!

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Franek,

All I am going to say is that more research is required on your part. ;)

Stephen

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

But which part?

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

The WHOLE part...;)

Stephen

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

306 Sqn definetelly had red spinners and 316 definetelly was not at Peterhead, so what part?

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

Hello,

Just to add a little to Franek's remark on those Mk IV's and the camoflage.

Taken from the Camoflage and Markings RAF Fighter Command Northern Europe 1936 to 1945 series issue on the N.A. Mustang.

Quote
Mustang IV's entered Squadron service during March/April 1945 and althougyh a small number were already camoflaged in accordance with Drawing Pattern E (page 35) (these went mainly to Italy and North African and Indian bases) those operating in the European Theatre were generaly finished aluminium overall.
end quote
So only the first few Mk IV's as Franek suggests would be camoflaged.
Franek, where did you get the number from of the first 30 please. As the serial numbers KH685 and KH 695 fall outside of the first 30 which were KH641 to KH670.
All for now
Alex

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

No,the light blue and white colours were peacetime colours for 19 Sqn.They were in fact applied when the squadron moved to Molesworth post-war.Colours used at Peterhead were Wingbased markings.

Stein

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

I don't have very much to add but can confirm the 234 sqn darker spinner with these two pictures, taken from some website I can't find again at the moment. I believe this is the 234 Sqn Mustang that came down in Denmark towards the end of the war, in late April or early May 1945.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/10...d/863530cb.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/10...d/e394e8e8.jpg

Re: Individual letter on F/Lt. Frederick Hilley Bradford's P-51 Mustang MK.IV?
 

The phptos have been showed at this site before. The origin is
http://www.zone-redningskorpset.dk/h...4!OpenDocument

The "Zone-Redningskorpset" that the website is about was a Danish rescue company that merged with another company to become Falck http://www.falck.com/about-forside-uk

More information on this incident at Søren Flensted's Airwar over Denmark:
http://www.flensted.eu.com/1945050.shtml

Mikkel