506TH PIR Easy Company "Band of Brothers" C-47 Markings

[Graham Boak]

I have Ottery (Upottery in RAF parlance) as a base for the 439th, and that is what was quoted as the base for Easy Company in BoB - my son just left me the DVDs, and I watched them over the weekend. Chilbolton I have as P-47s not C-47s, of the 368th FG. Action Stations 6 says nothing about any D-Day transport operations from Chilbolton. The 438th flew from Greenham Common, with the first wave. The 439th was following (second wave?), which wasn't quite the impression given, and the book states that the 101st was dropped on target, Col Sink himself landing within 200 yds of the aiming point, despite a lack of pathfinder lights. Three aircraft were missing from the 439th, there is a picture of another (D8-coded) with flak damage to the outer wing. Overall, despite some scattering, only one unit of the 82nd was "badly dropped". Again, not quite the impression given in the film.

References in Rust to other units has the 434th with gliders from Welford Park, and the 437th with gliders. Freeman in The 9th Air Force in Colour has the 437th at Ramsbury, the 436th at Membury. There is a photo of gliders at Chilbolton for Market Garden, and this is mentioned in Action Stations 6. Does your reference to Membury and Chilbolton apply to Market Garden not Overlord?

Young's aircraft had radar - by implication so would the other formation leaders. Does anyone have information on what this would look like?