Galland's Emil

During the height of the Battle of Britain in 1940, Hermann Goering visited the Luftwaffe fighter units arrayed along the Channel Front in western France.   During a stop at Jagdgeschwader 26 (JG26) and growing impatient of the stalemate in the battle for air superiority over London and the perceived lack of effort from his fighter pilots, Goering berated his officers to the point of insinuating cowardice.  In reality, it was Goering’s lack of understanding of fighter tactics and strategy that led to the impasse.  He insisted that his fighters stick close to the bombers, robbing them of initiative and the freedom to roam, acquire and attack the enemy.   The fighter commanders countered, arguing that only by unleashing their Messerschmitts in the same way the British unleashed their Spitfires, could the battle be won.  Goering dismissed this notion, becoming more infuriated with their insolence.  After minutes of silence from his appalled and humiliated pilots, Goering smiled, apologized for his outburst and calmly asked a young squadron commander what immediate need the Luftwaffe high command could provide him.  The young German officer with dark, slicked-back hair and Clark Gable mustache glared at the Reichmarshall and smartly replied:

“I should like an outfit of Spitfires for my squadron.”

If he never did another thing in his entire life, Adolf Galland guaranteed himself aviation legend status with those ten spoken words.  But Galland indeed did more.  He shot down a total of 104 aircraft, was awarded the coveted Knights Cross with oak leaves, swords and diamonds, introduced the Me-262 jet fighter into combat with the famed JV-44 and was a lauded innovator of fighter tactics that are used to this day.  When his mentor, General of Fighters Werner Moelders, was killed in a plane crash, Goering promoted Galland to the position, thus becoming the youngest General in the German armed forces.  He was a swaggering presence who enjoyed women and cognac equally and was rarely seen without his ever-ready black cigar perched in his fingers (much to the chagrin of Adolf Hitler).  Without his deadly serious attitude towards air combat (and a record to back it up) he could have been judged as larger than life... cartoonish.  In fact, the only thing cartoonish about the man was the Mickey Mouse character he had painted on his aircraft (even it had a sinister side; Galland’s Mickey held a hatchet and pistol and clenched a cigar in its teeth).  Perhaps more than all this, Galland was a gentleman warrior, respected and revered by his men and enemies alike for the sense of decency and respect he gave to all combatants, regardless of nationality.  To note, despite his rank of general officer, Galland was never a member of the Nazi party and was never suspected or investigated for involvement in war crimes.  

There are many great stories of Galland; too many to relate within the confines of this blog. Besides the beautifully insubordinate answer to an enraged Hermann Goering, two more Galland tales are worth at least mentioning: He once loaded the storage compartment of his Bf 109F with champagne and lobsters and flew off to the 49th birthday party of General Theo Osterkamp. On a hunch, he led his wingman over the Channel and found an unlucky flight of Spitfires conducting aerial training near Dover. He shot down three Spits in quick order and made his way back to the festivities without breaking a single bottle of bubbly.

On another occasion, Galland’s unit tangled with a group of British Spitfires near Saint-Omer, France in August, 1941.  Upon returning to base, Galland discovered famed British pilot, the legless Douglas Bader had gone down in the melee, survived and was in custody of German forces. Galland invited Bader to stay with JG26 for a few days as a guest of honor, an act of respect and true chivalry. Galland gave him the grand tour, wined and dined with him and almost let him take a Messerschmitt around the pattern. He even arranged with the Red Cross to give “free passage” to British aircraft at a set time to air-drop new prosthetic legs for Bader, whose previous ones were destroyed in the dogfight and subsequent bail-out. The air-drop did occur but not without the British taking full advantage of the “free passage”… Galland’s airfield was immediately strafed by Spitfires, but otherwise undamaged in this exchange of pleasantries.   Note: Galland and Bader would become lifelong friends after the war, with Bader returning the favor of hospitality to Galland as the latter was held in England during the post-war interrogation process. 

General Adolf Galland lived a long and productive life after the war.  He was the rare leader who was respected by all who knew him and flew with or against him.  He enjoyed the friendship of his former adversaries, built a successful aviation consultancy business and was a beloved speaker and member of The Gathering of Eagles.  He lived in a comfortable home in Oberwinter, Germany among his war relics and memories, where he died on February 9, 1996 with his wife and two grown children present.

THE MODEL:  Tamiya’s 1/48 scale Messerschmitt Bf 109E 4/7 was an absolute pleasure to build.  From taking off the cellophane to attaching the prop to the finished model, there was not one negative experience.  I chose to build Galland’s “Emil”, work  number 5819, which had a non-standard, transitional paint scheme and (for a brief time) an optical scope mounted through the windscreen.  (Note:  the scope was not used to “aim at” enemy aircraft during a dogfight, but rather search for them at long distances in cruise flight). This particular aircraft had 57 kills denoted on the rudder, which places it circa late November/December, 1940. Galland would spend just a few months in this mount before being promoted to Oberst and taking delivery of a new F Model in early 1941. Research shows that this particular Emil went through various paint jobs in 1940, with variations of an RLM 02/71/65 scheme and a later experimental (soon to be standard) scheme of RLM 74/75/76. The prop spinner also changed frequently, from color variations of yellow and white, to “capped” and “uncapped” configurations.  Ultimately, it was the yellow cowlings that Galland and his aircraft of JG26 were famous for, immediately recognizable to the British and earned them sobriquets such as “The Abbeville Boys” and “The Yellow Nosed Bastards”.

Coming out of the box at a slow trot, I built up and painted an Aires resin cockpit and added a set of Ultracast wheels and seat.  I made my share of goofs and do-overs during the main build (the cantilevered tail struts really tested my patience).  The trickiest part was modeling and mounting the telescopic scope, which required a lot of planning and forethought. To begin with, the Tamiya does not include the optional windscreen with a hole in it for the scope (as Hasegawa’s “Galland” Bf 109E4 does).  So I taped both sides of the clear windscreen with blue painters tape, and carefully bored a tiny hole through the plastic with my Dremel and a micro bit.  (The tape is an absolute necessity… it prevents the drill bit from skipping and the brittle clear plastic from cracking).  Next, I fashioned a miniature scope tube from a hypodermic needle and two eye pieces from aluminum tube (which telescopically fit the needle). I hand sanded and ground both eye pieces to form an accurate taper.  I then painted these three pieces black and detailed them with a #2 lead pencil.  Gluing one eyepiece onto the end of the tube, I then mounted the tube through the windscreen hole, set it with clear jewelers glue, and finished by gluing on the other tapered eyepiece.

After the telescopic scope, it was off to the races.    The ‘Schmitty was assembled, sanded and prepped and given a quick pre-shading of RLM 66 scale black.  I don’t always pre-shade my builds, but in this case I think the combination and light colors and patterns demanded it.  I also pre-shaded the cowling with burnt umber which brought out some amazing engine-heat detail on the RLM 04 Yellow cowling .  I shot the entire model (sans cowling and rudder) with RLM 76 Light Gray and followed up with the RLM 74/75 camouflage.  The entire scheme was shot freehand with my Paasche VL, with the exception of the straight edge wing and upper fuselage demarcations.  For those, I floated a template just above the surface, held in place with little balls of poster putty, and sprayed the darker color over the light. This gave a subtle feathered edge to the patterns.  After the paint and gloss coat, I peeled open a Ziploc baggie of Aeromaster’s  “Kommodore Galland” decals (PAF 48-01, saved and unopened since 1998) and went to work. 

I had to be extremely careful in the depiction of Galland’s Work Number 5819.  Most of his Bf 109E’s during the Battle of Britain were very similar in their markings. He and his mounts are well documented with black and white photographs, but the similarities make the research frustrating.   It is known that he experiemented with the "grays" (RLM 74/75/76) scheme before it became standard and perhaps the color photo below taken in December, 1940 denotes this.  Most photos of his aircraft include only partial shots, so without reference to a rudder and/or kill markings, my guess is that most models of Galland’s mount at an exact time and place in late 1940 are an amalgam of his several planes and paint jobs.  Mine most certainly is, although I’d like to think otherwise. 

Enjoy the pics, and again, thanks for stopping by. Please leave a comment. Stay tuned for the next post. Cheers!

Gabreski's Jug

Let’s get things rolling with the Republic P-47D25 "Thunderbolt”. The "Jug” as it was affectionately known by the men who flew it, was big, fast and tougher than woodpecker lips. It was the United States’ answer to the Third Reich’s venerable Messerschmitt Bf-109 with the added bonus of being an outstanding ground attack aircraft. Until the arrival of the P-51 Mustang, the P-47 performed patrol, escort and attack duties with equal zeal and accolades. The most successful P-47 pilot in history was Lieutenant Colonel Francis Gabreski, 61st Fighter Squadron of the 56th Fighter Group, USAAF (as in Army Air Forces).

Perhaps the most beautifully painted of all combat aircraft, Gabby’s “HV-A” during the summer of 1944 was a masterpiece in color, contrast and camouflage.  Erratic “Luftwaffe” style gray/green oversprayed patterns, sharply contrasting black and white ETO invasion stripes and Richthoffenesque flashes of blood red on the nose and rudder set HV-A apart from the other aircraft in the 8^th Air Force's stable. One can only imagine the fear it instilled in the young German fighter pilots who chanced coming across it, especially with the 28 German swastika flags (kill markings) that Gabby advertised under his left canopy, denoting that he was open for business.  But like life, all things of function and beauty must come to an end.  On July 20^th, 1944 near Bassenheim, Germany, Gabby pranged his prop during a low (very low) strafing pass on a German airfield.  After a few bounces and an engine seizure, Gabby set “HV-A” down for the last time in a wheat field just several hundred feet away from enemy positions.  He spent the rest of the war as a guest of the Germans at the infamous Stalag Luft I.  He survived and went on to more aerial exploits several years later over Korea flying F-86 Sabre jets.  The final disposition of “HV-A” is unknown, but it was presumed destroyed after the below photograph was taken by Luftwaffe forces at Bassenheim.  
  

Francis Gabreski is one of my all-time aviation heroes for a number of reasons. First, he was a Pennsylvania boy like myself. Second, he was United States' all-time leading ace in the ETO, regardless of airplane type. Third, he persevered through setbacks and failures in flight school to become a tremendous pilot and leader during our county’s involvement in World War II and the Korean conflict.

I have a personal memory about Gabby that I will always cherish: In March of 2000, I was an active duty military pilot stationed in Savannah, GA flying reconnaissance aircraft. Gabby and I had made contact through a mutual friend and I wrote him a letter and mentioned that I would love to take a training flight to Long Island, NY (where he lived at the time) and have lunch with him. A few weeks later, I received a letter from Gabby not only inviting me up for lunch, but where to taxi and park my aircraft at the local airport when I arrived! He included his phone number and said to call him from airport operations and that he would personally come and pick me up for lunch.  Huh?  One of America's all-time leading fighter aces picking me up for lunch? Wow! Needless to say, I was ecstatic.

I called Gabby before my trip, but we postponed due to a cable television appearance he was obligated to do that week (TDC's Wings, if I'm not mistaken).  Not a problem... the beautiful thing about training flights is that they are recurring events.  We made plans for a later date and said our goodbyes. Sadly, he passed away soon thereafter, before I could make the trip to meet my hero.  I saved his letter though, and just last night, re-read it and showed it to my daughter who was profoundly moved.  I have included it below for no purpose other than to share my memory of the man who, although I did not get to meet, still holds a special place in my thoughts.

THE MODEL:  The 1/48 scale Hasegawa "Special Markings" kit that was built pretty much out of the box except for a resin cockpit, wheels, hypo needle gun barrels and pitot tube.  (Interesting tip on the pitot tube:  to model the pitot vane, I shaved the semi-rounded corner off a Fender guitar pick, glued it into place on a 19 gauge, clipped hypodermic needle).  Presto…a pitot tube that won't bend or snap off because of a stray pinky finger from my sometimes clumsy hand.  The cockpit was painted with a home-brewed recipe of U.S. medium green and British foliage green to replicate the color Republic used in finishing the Jug’s office. Once the cockpit was painted, washed and dry-brushed, the kit practically fell together like most Hasegawa products do.  After the gear bays and external details were reckoned with, the model was prepped, primed, sanded and airbrushed with a Paasche VL siphon double-action, pushing Polly Scale acrylics at an alcohol-thinned 80/20 ratio at about 22 psi.  British Ocean Gray as the top base, Medium Sea Gray on the bottom, and British Dark Green for the camouflage. My technique involves many light coats of camouflage colors, alternating between dark-on-light and light-on dark to give a true over-sprayed appearance. After the gloss coat, it was time to decal the aircraft and turn it into Gabreski’s famous steed.  Markings were provided, but the notoriously heavy-filmed Hasegawa decals were enshrined in my spares drawer in favor of TechMod’s “HV-A” livery. Techmod decals are very thin and fragile, but of great quality and registration. Solvent solutions are no-no with these babies; use a setting solution on an extremely glossy surface to emolliate the film into the model’s contours. Note: I masked and painted the wing invasion stripes, but used TechMod’s decal fuselage stripes.  Reason?  Gabby’s aircraft in mid 1944 had unique white invasion stripes on the fuselage that were outlined in black.  The fuselage scheme had no alternating black stripes during this period, as did the wings. TechMod has done an outstanding job in replicating the appearance of this nuance and their decals were a huge time saver.   A little weathering to finish things off and a shot of Polly Scale flat sealed the deal.  Literally. The canopy and windscreen were dutifully dipped in Future, dried, masked and painted with Model Master aluminum and set with Elmer’s “clear” school glue (this stuff is amazing, and IMHO, the best semi-rigid clear parts cement on the market…and the $2 bottle will last forever).  The propeller on “HV-A” was unique in that the prop boss appears to be neither metallic nor black, but seemingly a dark glossy gray (oil?) and the hub was highly polished almost to the point of looking like chrome, which was probably a cosmetic perk given to Gabreski (who by 1944 was the squadron CO) by his ground crew.  Nonetheless, I modeled, painted and weathered the prop according this research and my model was complete.

The kit, although aged, is typical of the high quality Hasegawa product and still sets a relatively high standard for this scale and type (although I hear the newer Tamiya shake-n-bake version is without equal).  It has been written about so prolifically in magazines and other media that I’ll spare you the details of praises and imperfections to include the infamous “Grand Canyon” gap at the lower wing/fuselage joint. While I'm on the subject of imperfections, I remember working on this build a few years ago and reading somewhat heated discussions on the net concerning Gabreski’s paint job.  Bare metal underside or British Medium Sea Gray? (Sea Gray…Gabreski verified it himself years later).  Field mixed paints or factory colors?  I once read an entire post of two guys basically insulting each other’s mother because of their disagreement on the shade of red used on the 61^st FS cowling and tail!   Here is my take on these and similar debates (which I call The Clash of the Know-It-Alls):  While discussion and disagreement is welcome among hobbyists and amateur historians, and accuracy should be our goal, the most important thing to remember is… it’s a hobby.  We are reproducing scaled plastic facsimiles of real aircraft with very few photographic references. We are left with black and white, low quality images and 65-year-old recollections of a vehicle whose total history was measured in days.   Just today as I was researching my Mitsubishi A6M3 build, I was astounded at the amount of controversy over the shade of exterior gray of IJN aircraft. Too much information.  As a formally trained fine artist, let me say this: color is relative. Period. Tree trunks are not brown; they are pink when facing a setting sun, blue-gray on a rainy morning, and invisible to drunk drivers.  As my wife constantly reminds me, we need to get over ourselves.  (More color theory to come on future posts). So there you have it, folks... my first blog entry.  I hope you enjoyed it.  More aircraft, histories and ramblings to come. Thanks for stopping by!