[Bill Walker]

I think your example from the Hurricane POH shows why the RAF made its own documents for US aircraft. The references to the RAF Training Manual (which probably contains the "more details about how to get out of a spin") would be useful information to anyone who had gone through RAF training, but would not be present in a US manual. The Hurricane quote provides extra information unique to the type, but the Training Manual also needs to be understood to fully operate the Hurricane. The description of the Hurricane's spin recovery may appear dry, but it is quite factual, and would be understood by anyone used to reading such manuals.

You may be interested to know that the RCAF wrote its own pilot's notes for new aircraft types, even when both US and RAF manuals were available. They did this in part because of the need to use terms familiar to RCAF trained pilots, and to provide necessary information relevant to Canadian operations - cold weather usage, interfacing with visiting aircraft servicing at RCAF fields, etc. The RAF would have had similar needs not filled by the US manuals.

As for the US "cartoony" style versus the RAF style, I think this may reflect the expected educational background of the readers. The RAF (and RCAF) required candidate pilots to have a university degree early in the war, the US draftees may have had less previous exposure to high level documents.