Base to the legendary Douglas Bader Fighter Wing during the Battle of Britain, Duxford became home to the 78th Fighter Group in April 1943. Today it appropriately houses the American Air Museum, and hosts the many summer air-shows where crowds thrill to the sight and sound of the glorious WWII warbirds. First equipped with P-47 Thunderbolts then P-51Ds, the 78th Fighter Group was credited with 688 enemy aircraft destroyed, 474 in the air, and another 406 destroyed on the ground during low-level strafing missions. Charles London of the 78th became the 8th Air Forces first fighter ace of the war and a 78th pilot, Quince Brown, was the first to down a Me262 jet in August 1944. It is March 1945. Led by Colonel John Landers flying Big Beautiful Doll, one of the 8th Air Forces most flamboyant fighters, the 78th P-51D Mustangs roar off the field to begin an escort mission taking B-17 Fortresses already airborne in the background all the way to Hamburg.
Item Code : NT0316
Duxford Eagles by Nicolas Trudgian - Editions Available
As Red Dog Norleys P-51D screams across the field at hangar height with his squadrons Mustangs fanned out behind him, the 4th Fighter Group pilots jink through the intense groundfire wreaking havoc on the ground. In this, its final major mission of the war, the group destroyed no fewer than 105 enemy aircraft in two blishtering airfield attacks.
Item Code : DHM2053
Mustang Mayhem by Nicolas Trudgian. - Editions Available
With their brightly coloured checkertail tails there was no mistaking the P.51 Mustangs of the 325th Fighter Group. Escorting B-24s over Austria in August 1944, tangled with a group of Fw190 fighters. The ensuing dogfight spiraled down below the mountain peaks as Herky Green led the Checkertails in a low-level chase. Herky nails one Fw190. Behind him his pilots will take out the two Fw190. When all is done this day the 325th will be credited with 15 enemy fighters destroyed.
Item Code : DHM2023
Checkertail Clan by Nicolas Trudgian - Editions Available
Wherever the GIs went they took their Jeeps with them, and before the war was run the little quarter-ton, 4-wheel drive, utility vehicle was as well known around the world as the Model T Ford. Nicolas Trudgian has painted a compelling image, set back in time when the little Jeep was omnipresent on and around the roads and battlefields of a war-torn world. It is Christmas 1944 and, as a gaggle of 339th FG P-51 Mustangs disturb the peace of this ancient English village, a little Jeep waits patiently outside the pub while her occupants sample the local ale. A wonderfully nostalgic painting that will bring back pleasant memories to many.
Item Code : DHM2591
Welcome Respite by Nicolas Trudgian. - Editions Available
In a scene that was repeated almost daily throughout the long war years, the pilots of the 357th Fighter Group have returned from a gruelling mission to their base in Leiston, Suffolk. As they clamber out of their aircraft, all eyes are turned anxiously skyward, awaiting the return of the last man home.
Item Code : DHM2025
Last Man Home by Nicolas Trudgian. - Editions Available
Mustangs Over the Eagles Nest by Nicolas Trudgian.
Obersalzberg, a spectacularly picturesque area of southern Germany in the Bavarian Alps, became a focal point for the Allies as World War II was drawing to its close. This mountain village had become a Nazi stronghold after the Third Reich had seized houses, farms, and some 600 acres, and built private residences for Martin Bormann and Hermann Goering, an SS barracks, and erected a 30kmn fence around the perimeter to deter intrusion. At its centre was the Berghoff, Adolf Hitlers private mountain retreat. Crowning Bormanns lavish building programme was the house he had built on a rocky spur almost 3000 feet above the Obersalzberg, some 6000 feet above sea level. Reached via a twisting road blasted out of the mountainside, the house was approached after entering a tunnel via a large brass two story elevator rising over 400 feet to the building. The Kelilsteinhaus was Martin Bormanns present for Hitter on the occasion of his 50th birthday in 1939. It was known by the Allies as the Eagle.........
A4 Size Double Sheet 11.5 inches x 8 inches (30m x 21cm)
none
£1.50
Teamwork by Nicolas Trudgian.
P-51 Mustangs of the 20th Fighter Group make a low pass over B-17s of the 401st Bomb Group at Deenethorpe, as they return to their base at Kingscliffe in late 1944.
Item Code : DHM2680
Teamwork by Nicolas Trudgian. - Editions Available
From the day they began their aerial campaign against Nazi Germany to the cessation of hostilities in 1945, the USAAF bomber crews plied their hazardous trade in broad daylight. This tactic may have enabled better sighting of targets, and possibly less danger of mid-air collisions, but the grievous penalty of flying daylight missions over enemy territory was the ever presence of enemy fighters. Though heavily armed, the heavy bombers of the American Eighth Air Force were no match against the fast, highly manoeuvrable Me109s, Fw190s and, late in the war, Me 262 jet fighters which the Luftwaffe sent up to intercept them. Without fighter escort they were sitting ducks, and inevitably paid a heavy price. Among others, one fighter group earned particular respect, gratitude, and praise from bomber crews for their escort tactics. The 356th FG stuck rigidly to the principle of tight bomber escort duty, their presence in tight formation with the bombers often being sufficient to deter enemy at.........
As the Autumn of 1944 turned to winter, the USAAF Eighth Air Force bombers were penetrating ever deeper into enemy territory, attacking distant targets in central and south-east Germany. Large formations of seven or eight hundred bombers, escorted by as many fighters, darkened the skies over the Reich. Central to the massive daylight raids was the long-range capabilities of the P-51 Mustang, the most versatile fighter of the war. Despite incessant pounding from the air, the Luftwaffe were putting up determined resistance, particularly in the south, often sending up several hundred fighters to meet the challenge. Huge aerial battles were fought between the opposing groups of fighters, and though the Allied pilots usually gained the upper hand in these encounters, the air fighting was prolonged and furious. Typical of those encounters, on a single mission in November the Allied estimate of Luftwaffe sorties flown against them exceeded 750, but often the German fighters were handicapped.........
Major Jim Goodson taxies his 4th (The Eagles) Fighter Group P-51 D Mustang at Debden following a mission to supply air support over the Normandy beaches soon after D-Day, June 1944. Having previously flown Spitfires and Hurricanes with the RAF, Spitfires with 133 Eagle Squadron, and P-47 Thunderbolts with the Fourth fighter group, Jim Goodson became one of the USAAFs top fighter pilots of WWII.
Item Code : NT0001
Eagles of the Eighth by Nicolas Trudgian. - Editions Available
Part of a small print series of six American WW2 aircraft, signed by some of the great American pilots, some no longer with us. Cranston Fine Arts have purchased the last remaining stocks of this aviation series.
Item Code : DHM2652
P-51 Mustang by Nicolas Trudgian. - Editions Available
