Supermarine Walrus K8556 - crashed December the 12th 1939

[Quiet Mike]

Please find below some research I have done into a Supermarine Walrus that crashed less than a mile from my house here in Southampton, unfortunately with the loss of all four crew, in the first few months of the War.

 

Supermarine are a pet subject of mine for obvious reasons, especially their flying boats and float planes. (The Itchen works are just the next parish along from me here in Sholing)

I only recently found out about K8556, and I'd like to build up a 1:48 Airfix kit in their honour. I have reached a stumbling block though and I'm not sure what its wartime colours would have been? I'm assuming it would not have been in it's prewar silver dope finish? But the photo below of it on the hardstand at Lee-on-the-Solent is from September 1st 1939, and it is in silver dope? I would have thought it would have been in standard camouflage by then?

 

Can any experts point me in the right direction?

 

Walrus MkI K8556, HMS Daedulus, Sept 1st 1939 by Mike, on Flickr

 

MkI Walrus K8556, from the manual by Mike, on Flickr

 

Supermarine Walrus MkI K8556, Black 34, HMS Southampton by Mike, on Flickr

 

 

The 12th of December 1939 was a stormy winters day, with low cloud over Southampton. This was the middle of the ’Phoney War’, that strange 8 month lull after Germany invaded Poland in September when we expected Germany to invade at any moment, and were under a constant fear of air raids.

754 Squadron Fleet Air Arm RN was stationed nearby at HMS Daedalus, the RNAS seaplane station at Lee on the Solent. (It’s still there and is now home to the Hovercraft Museum.)

That afternoon a Royal Navy Supermarine Walrus MkI K8556 took off on a training flight, with a crew of four on board. Designed by RJ Mitchell and built in Woolston, Southampton, the prototype Walrus first flew in 1933. A hardy little single engine biplane, and one of the first amphibious aircraft to enter squadron service in 1936, with a folding undercarriage that allowed it to land and take off on both water and land. It was also built tough enough to be launched by catapult on board ships, and K8556 saw previous service on the new Town Class Light Cruiser HMS Southampton in 1938, as Black 34. Launched by catapult at 70mph, its main role was reconnaissance and to act as a spotter for the ships guns, before landing in the water beside the ship and being recovered by the ships crane. Like Mitchell’s more famous design the Spitfire, it would remain in service all through the war and beyond.

On board this flight were pilots Lt Herriot-Hill (aged 24) of the RN and Pilot Officer Fortnum (19) of the RAF, along with Leading Airman McLoughlin (25) and Air Mechanic Moorhead (19), both RN. Their training flight would take them over Southampton, a prime target for the German Luftwaffe with it’s docks and aircraft factories and very much on the front line, and defended by Anti Aircraft (Ack Ack) defences. As well as light and heavy guns and searchlights these also included barrage balloons, flown over the city on strong cables that would destroy any aeroplane that hit them, and designed to hinder low level bombing raids. Parks and playing fields were ideal places to site this units in built up areas, and the Veracity Recreation Ground in Sholing was home to a Bofors Ack Ack gun, a searchlight and a barrage balloon unit. They were controlled by the Ack Ack Command HQ who would inform them when raids were expected, and local RAF and FAA squadrons would be briefed to know where these anti aircraft sites were located and what height the balloons would be winched out to so they didn’t fly into them. Unfortunately on this winters afternoon with it’s bad weather and poor visibility, the Walrus hit the cable of the barrage balloon moored at the Veracity. It was critically damaged and came down at the bottom of Lances Hill, in the front garden of 340 Bitterne Road. All four crew members died in the crash. (Directly opposite Hum Hole, the area of ground were parts of aircraft were reportedly dumped, and visible long after the war.)

McLoughlin, Fortnum and Herriot-Hill are all buried in Haslar Royal Navy Cemetery in Gosport. Moorhead at Hartlepool West View Cemetery in Durham.

Richard Herriot Mackay Herriot-Hill (24), Lieut, R.N., of Spring Gardens. London, S.W.
Michael Fortnum (19), R.A.F. officer, Grove Road, East Molesey, Surrey
Michael M’Loughlin (25), Leading Airman, Mersea Road, Colchester, Essex
Louis Moorhead (19), air mechanic, Malton Street, East Hartlepool, Durham.

References -

Sussex History Forum
http://sussexhistoryforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=7953.0

CWGC records
https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2438432/fortnum,-michael/
https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2438597/mcloughlin,-michael/
https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2838248/moorhead,-louis/
https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2438495/heriot-hill,-richard-heriot-mackay/

 

Crash Report
https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=202861

 

 

 

**Additional information, from More memories of Bitterne by Irene Pilson.**

The crash was seen by a great many eyewitnesses at the time, but lots of contradictory memories of what exactly happened.

Tony White, 14, saw the Walrus fly over from his house in Witt’s Hill, Midanbury, then hit a ballon cable from a barrage balloon unit stationed in the nearby grounds of St Mary’s College. He watched in horror as it came to an abrupt halt on hitting the cable, and saw if disappear behind trees in a pall of smoke.

Eyewitness Flt Lt Sherwood of the RAF stated at the inquest that the balloon was visible, but he couldn’t see the cable. The conditions were hazy, with variable visibility of about two mile. He saw the Walrus head directly towards it, and a piece of it flew off when it made contact with the cable. He said the Walrus did not fall immediately below the cable. It went into a spin, and he thought from hearing the tone of the engine change that the pilot was trying to recover from the spin. His view of the actual crash was obscured by a house, but he heard the impact and saw a burst of flame.

Mrs Claire Moody also saw the Walrus collide with the cable, it’s left wing hitting it, making the machine swing round and turn over three times before hitting the nosediving and hitting the ground.

Mr Harold Mouland, of Southsea, was actually involved in the crash, as he drove down Lances Hill. He careered with the wreckage into the front garden of 340 Bitterne Rd. (luckily the house was unoccupied at the time)

The aircraft burst into flames when it crashed. Help was soon on the scene from men of the Ack Ack detachment nearby. (The St Mary’s College site is a lot closer than Veracity Rec, where eyewitness Colin Wilkins thought the barrage balloon involved was. Also, as Tony White saw the Walrus fly directly over his house in Witt’s Hill, and St Mary’s is directly in line with the eventual crash site at Lances Hill.

Builder Mr W Angell was also on the scene with his workers, and together with the soldiers they tried to rescue the aircrew from the wreckage but the flames were too fierce and beat them back. Two fire engines arrived and the crews worked hard to extinguish the blaze, and stopped it spreading to the houses nearby.

Edited February 3, 2020 by Quiet Mike

[Work In Progress]

There is another pic from the same shoot here which I shall link rather than embed to avoid any possible licensing brouahaha for BM. The other two aircraft in shot are in aluminium dope too.

https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/supermarine-walrus-mk1-serial-number-k8556-single-engine-news-photo/716547025

Edited February 3, 2020 by Work In Progress

[Quiet Mike]

1 hour ago, Work In Progress said:

There is another pic from the same shoot here which I shall link rather than embed to avoid any possible licensing brouahaha for BM. The other two aircraft in shot are in aluminium dope too.

https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/supermarine-walrus-mk1-serial-number-k8556-single-engine-news-photo/716547025

Thanks WiP, I haven't seen this particular photo before.

[Work In Progress]

I am far from expert in the early-war Fleet Air Arm but like you, I would have probably assumed that by September 1939 the Navy's Walrus fleet would have been in camouflage. Yet here we are with three bright aluminium examples.  I am also a bit surprised at the mixed Navy / RAF make-up of the crew on the fateful flight.

 

I note that this sheet has a 1939 Aluminium aircraft at and a 1940 camouflaged one,, both ship-board aircraft, I wish they could be pinned down to months.

https://www.hannants.co.uk/product/HMD72089

 

I wonder if perhaps the three Lee-on-Solent examples were waiting to be repainted and were in reserve, with (by September) all the ship-board examples having been done?

[mhaselden]

A cursory glance at Stuart Lloyd's.book on FAA camouflage shows Skuas still in silver dope in the autumn of 1939 and a Swordfish floatplane still uncamouflaged as late as January 1940. 

 

It's possible this Walrus was still in silver dope but we may never know for sure.

[iang]

I would think silver dope most likely in December 1939 for this Walrus, given the aircraft's history. The Admiralty was slow to implement camouflage instructions for some types of FAA aircraft. The application of camouflage to second-line squadrons was particularly patchy in the early part of the war, and there are numerous examples of aircraft still in pre-war finish in late 1939/early 1940 (and in rare cases much later). Even front-line units could remain uncamouflaged long after camouflage was mandated. For example, Warspite's  Swordfish at Narvik in April 1940 (and Ark Royal's 800 Squadron Skuas until at least February 1940).

 

HTH,

 

IG (AKA Stuart Lloyd).