Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies Posted January 31, 2017 Share Posted January 31, 2017 Hi all, Having lived in NE Scotland almost all of my life, I had never stopped at the Banff Strike Wing memorial until Sunday. I expect many already know about Black Friday, but it was the dubious moniker given to 9th February 1945 when the Banff Strike Wing attacked the German destroyer Z33 escorted by 2 flak ships in Førde Fjord near Haugesund, Norway. It panned out a lot like the ficticious 633 Squadron film depicted and the highest losses of any Coastal Command strike wing during the entire war were taken. 14 Beaufighter crew members died, with several more captured and taken prisoner of war. The Beaus were intercepted by Fw190s scrambled from Herdla who shot down 2 of the Beaufighters, whilst the rest were shot down by flak unable to employ their usual multi-directional attacks to overwhelm the anti-aircraft guns in a steep fjord. Rudi Linz in his Fw190A-8 shot down his 70th and final allied aircraft, a 65 Sqn Mustang from RAF Peterhead before being shot down and killed himself by another Mustang. I took some photos of the memorial on Sunday and posted them on our site here. It was an unusually nice day so it seemed a good time to go (on a whim, as is my style): https://www.sovereignhobbies.co.uk/blogs/news/black-friday-9th-february-1945 As well as being topical and based local to me, Black Friday is also my wife's birthday. I've decided I'd like to build some models. I'm struggling with the Mustangs though. I know these were Mustang IIIs, but not whether they had framed P-51B canopies or Malcolm Hoods (probably the latter, but need confirmation). I'd be especially grateful if anyone could point me to decals for 65 Sqn Mustangs for the period of February 1945. Better still, does anyone know where I might find the identity of the single Mustang shot down over Førde? 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
85sqn Posted January 31, 2017 Share Posted January 31, 2017 65 Sqn flew its first operation with Mustang MkIV's on 17th March so they were mustang MkIII's. Also by then they were with malcolm hoods. That info is from Ospreys RAF mustang and thunderbolt aces. I've recently been looking into mustang MkIIIs with 122 wing operating out of Funtington. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies Posted January 31, 2017 Author Share Posted January 31, 2017 Thanks Nick. That narrows it down to a Tamiya kit I have at home. Now to find decals. I've learned that the Mustang pilot killed was W/O Cecil Claude Caesar, but haven't found the serial or code letters of the aircraft. YT-something. Here's a little piece from Caesar's widow after being contacted by a Norwegian who had watched his Mustang crash when he was 9 years old and climbed the mountain in the hope of rescuing and hiding him from the Germans: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/15/a5970215.shtml 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies Posted January 31, 2017 Author Share Posted January 31, 2017 According to here http://www.historyofwar.org/air/units/RAF/65_wwII.html 65 Sqn moved to Peterhead (Longside) in January 1945, but lists them as being at Banff for January/February 1945 and back at Peterhead in March 1945. Maybe that's why I can't find much? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotthldr Posted January 31, 2017 Share Posted January 31, 2017 (edited) The serial you're after is HB836 YT-N Edited January 31, 2017 by scotthldr 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies Posted January 31, 2017 Author Share Posted January 31, 2017 Thanks Scott. That's the Mustang sorted then Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotthldr Posted January 31, 2017 Share Posted January 31, 2017 Can't find any decals depicting that a/c, but you can buy sheets of generic serial codes in all the various colours. Where about's in Aberdeen-shire are you, I live up in Inverness? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies Posted January 31, 2017 Author Share Posted January 31, 2017 I'm across between Turriff and Mintlaw. Banff is about 20 minutes north, and we sometimes go there to eat fish and chips on the sea wall My dad lives in Forres so closer to you than me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lawzer Posted February 28, 2017 Share Posted February 28, 2017 My in-laws had until recently a cottage in Whitehills and I'd seen the Strike Wing memorial quite a few years back and started reading up on it. It's kind of the reason I got back in to modelling - until then I had no idea the north east of Scotland played a fairly substantial role in WW2 (apart from Dyce that is...). Anyway, my plan is to build a beaufighter from 144 squadron (got some wonderful info from a couple of chaps on facebook), a mosquito (squadron undecided yet) and now quite possibly a Mustang. The info above will be of great use for this! Cheers Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevehnz Posted February 28, 2017 Share Posted February 28, 2017 Very interesting & poignant. Thanks James. Steve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rob85 Posted March 1, 2017 Share Posted March 1, 2017 After reading the article I can completely see why you want to build his plane, really touching. Good luck Rob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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