Mosquito: Menacing the Reich: Combat Action in the Twin-engine Wooden Wonder of World War II by Martin Bowman

Pass to San Severo, Italy, where they safely recovered. After repairs LR429 was written off the next day in a crash-landing after the crew tried to return to Benson. Both men were unhurt and they completed their tours. On 3 June 1954 following a test flight to Cuxhaven Watson was killed landing an RAF Canberra when a Night Photo Flash bomb exploded in the bomb bay. ( Pickup Coll )

On 11 September 38 Lancasters of 9 and 617 Squadrons, accompanied by a PR XVI Mosquito to provide up-todate target information and weather report, flew to their forward base at Yagodnikonanislandinthe Dvina River near Archangel, in northern Russia to attack the Tirpitz .On15 September the attack, by 28 Lancasters, 20 of which were carrying Tallboys and 6 or 7 others, twelve 500lb ’Johnny Walker' oscillating mines, went ahead and considerable damage was caused to the battleship. Subsequent PR revealed that although badly damaged, the Tirpitz was still afloat.
    On 17 October a detachment of four PR Mosquitoes of 540 Squadron was dispatched to Dyce to keep watch on Tirpitz . Information from the Norwegian resistance stared that the ship had left Kaa Fjord on its way south for Tromsø Fjord, where it was to be used as a heavy artillery battery. On 29 October 37 Lancasters (18 Lancasters each from 9 and 617 Squadrons plus the photographic aircraft from 463 Squadron) attacked the Tirpitz in Tromsö Fjord. Though no direct hits were scored a Tallboy near-miss by the stern caused considerable damage, distorting the propeller shaft and rudder, which flooded the bilges over a 100 foot length of the ship’s port side. The damage meant that the Tirpitz was no longer able to steam under her own power.

In the daylight reconnaissance 12 hours after the Peenemünde attack on 17/18 August 1943, photographs revealed 27 buildings in the northern manufacturing area destroyed and forty huts in the living and sleeping quarters completely flattened. The foreign labour camp to the south suffered worst of all and 500-600 foreign workers, mostly Polish, were killed. The whole target area was covered in craters. The raid is adjudged to have set back the V-2 experimental programme by at least two months and to have reduced the scale of the eventual rocket attack on Britain. ( Australian National Archives )

Bombing up a Mosquito with a ‘Cookie’ for a night raid on Berlin.

Sergeant Derek Smith, an observer/ navigator at 25 OTU, flew his first bombing operation in a Wellington on 10/11 September 1942 and completed his first tour with Pilot Officer Gordon Oldham’s Lancaster crew on 61 Squadron. Promoted to Pilot Officer, Derek Smith flew a second tour, 1 September 1944-12 March 1945, as a navigator on Mosquitoes in 692 Squadron, 8 (PFF) Group. He was awarded a bar to his DFC. ( Derek Smith Coll )

Canadian built B.XX KB326 ACTON ONTARIO CANADA was the first of two such aircraft to arrive at Hatfield on 12 August 1943. The B.XX was basically a Canadian-built B.IV. ( via Jerry Scutts )

A 4,000lb Cookie being hoisted aboard a Mosquito.

Flight Lieutenant Alfred J. Cork DFM of 109 Squadron in January 1945, a month after being shot down, on 27 December 1944 during an Oboe marking operation to Rheydt during the Battle of the Bulge when 200 Lancasters and eleven Mosquitoes attacked the marshalling yards. Cork and his pilot, Flight Lieutenant Hodgson, took off from Little Staughton at about 1300 hours in ML961 T-Tommy. After takeoff it soon became apparent that the cabin heating was not working properly, if at all. Soon after crossing the coast the windows became completely frosted over and visibility was virtually nil but they pressed on. They completed the release run and Cork believes that he had already received the release signal and he released the first TI when a burst of machine gun (or cannon) fire hit them. He could still see nothing through the iced up perspex. ‘Hodge’ signalled to him that they were out of control and pointed to the escape hatch. At that