THEN & NOW - ERRORS - PM-N

[Peter Cornwell]

Sorry to be late in joining this thread but I am only just back from India.

L5446 had already been picked up as the correct serial for PM*N flown by Sgt Beardsley on May 14, 1940, due to a better image recently coming to hand but I am nevertheless grateful for this correction. Interpretation of photos, sometimes of indifferent quality, is fraught enough but my main reason for this error was, as Iain rightly says, the aircraft was not recorded as ever being sent to France which lead me to L5516 as seemingly the only other candidate for a L5--6 loss. However, since publication, two photos of L5516 have surfaced (one as described in the thread) which now leads me to speculate that this was the aircraft flown by P/O Cunningham on that date indeed as proposed in the past by Arnaud Gillet.

My confusion over the various photos of P2193 of No.103 Squadron & K9353 of No.218 Squadron both downed on May 12 may be understandable, for there are similarities for sure, but should not have happened so my apologies to all. Corrected photo caption in hand.

Also, I now see that the photo on p331 is self-evidently Berry-au-Bac - it’s easy when you’re guided by those who know. But I am interested in Martin’s comment that K9366 was damaged on May 10, 1940, for I had no knowledge of that fact so any further confirmation will be much appreciated.

As Iain suggests, given the size & scope of BoFrT&N, it is inevitable that errors will abound & it had been my hope that publication would provoke exactly this sort of exchange as I do appreciate all contributions that allow us to document these events with better accuracy. I shall pick up his other thread shortly once I have dealt with some of the mails that awaited my return. Thanks to you all for your interest.