James Ginger Lacey-attack on 12 Bf109s-Sept 15,1940

[kaki3152]

Found this old drawing of a Hurricane attack on 12 Bf109s, along with the disparaging caption making fun of the drawing.

I was under the impression that this drawing was actually a graphic representation of Ginger Lacey's attack on September 15,1940 during the Battle of Britain.

Excerpt from Ginger Lacey Fighter Pilot by Bickers:
"But twelve yellow nosed Bf109s...had other ideas. In a flash, Lacey found himself racing head-on towards them. He dipped his nose as though to about to dive under them, then pulled back the stick and rocketed up in a loop, to attack the last one in the formation, which was lagging. He put a satisfactory burst into it while inverted, and, as he had plenty of speed, half-rolled off the top of his loop and followed the formation.'Who didn't seem to have seen their last man was diving vertically with flames pouring over his cockpit hood.'
Closing to 250 yards on No. 3 in the rear section . It pulled out of position with a white stream of glycol leaking out of its radiator...he fired the last of his bullets into the leader and dived vertically into cloud."

Comments?

[Larry]

Well apart from the incorrect Vic formation in the drawing, instead of 'finger four' about which the illustrator may have been unaware, I can't see why the rest of it cannot be true, especially if Ginger Lacey came out of cloud right in front of the Bf 109s, giving them very little time to react.

[kaki3152]

I know, it's the pilot sometimes and not the machine. James Lacey was a superb Hurricane pilot with 28 victories overall. During the BoB he claimed at least 17 Bf109Es.

[Laurent Rizzotti]

There are several instances of stories in which the leader of an air formation ignored warnings by wingmen about approaching enemy aircraft and continued on course, with disastrous results. I have read of such stories for German, Soviet and British units at least. Maybe this was the case there, with the last German aircraft being flown by rookies having a hard time just to keep formation.