A piece of WWII history

[Sinnlover]

There are flyable examples of the mossie in both the US and NZ.
Sadly the last airworthy version in the UK ‘bought the farm’ taking the crew with it.
The example in the US was stored in Florida which didn’t help its condition for a while, for the same reason it was not sent to the Far East in large numbers during the war. The humid conditions causes the ply to split.

https://youtu.be/HXjDRLTp44U?si=wDwJGdb7lQUtmeMY

https://youtu.be/mbWyCjI1Bas?si=DL3TnSWHPPoHnEdq

A couple of videos of low level raids on the Netherlands. Balls of steel, looking up at buildings at some points.

[thieuster]

The first video contains a detail (3:55'): "... and there's the Philips factory ahead!" That's worth extra attention. In short: Philips worked for the Nazis and the Allied forces at the same time. How?

Philips was and is a large electronics multinational. Before the war, light bulbs and household appliances were their main source of income. But they had a very distinct science lab where full-time inventors worked on magic things like TVs, but also sophisticated -for that time- artillery guidance systems). And it was already a multinational before the second world war. We had colonies (West and East Indies) and Philips had a big foot on the ground in the US. The Philips family was originally from Germany (Karl Marx and Gerard Philips, the founder, were cousins btw).

The Philips family realized that the war was inevitable and a large part of the family went to the States. A part of the family (most men) stayed behind in Eindhoven. With the move to the States, a lot of the 'secrets' went with them. The Germans occupied the factory and demanded that the production would be 100% for the German war machine. (And that resulted into bombing like the video shows!).

Philips had chopped up the company in holdings and trusts. A few in the Netherlands and confiscated by the Germans - which was to be expected. But the biggest parts of the company was in trusts in the UK, Can and the US. Where the Germans couldn't get their hands on.

However, there's more... The stay-behind Philips family members pressed the Germans for cheap labour. From the concentration camp Vught, near the factory in Eindhoven. Philips had nearly 500 Jewish employees from the camp. Nearly all survived the war. Dutch historians were always on two 'ideas': did Philips collaborate with the enemy or did they help the Jewish population and prevented them from getting murdered. In the end, the verdict goes to the positive side.

At the same time, over in the US, Philips produced for the Allied forces. Basically, every rear light on any army Jeep and Dodge was made by Philips USA.

[Neil.C]

There are flyable examples of the mossie in both the US and NZ.
Sadly the last airworthy version in the UK ‘bought the farm’ taking the crew with it.
The example in the US was stored in Florida which didn’t help its condition for a while, for the same reason it was not sent to the Far East in large numbers during the war. The humid conditions causes the ply to split.

https://youtu.be/HXjDRLTp44U?si=wDwJGdb7lQUtmeMY

https://youtu.be/mbWyCjI1Bas?si=DL3TnSWHPPoHnEdq

A couple of videos of low level raids on the Netherlands. Balls of steel, looking up at buildings at some points.

I think the plywood is the reason that more have not survived unfortunately.

I still have my RAF Biggin Hill programme from the '60's which included a flight of three mosquitoes doing a display.

[aa388]

I think the plywood is the reason that more have not survived unfortunately.

I still have my RAF Biggin Hill programme from the '60's which included a flight of three mosquitoes doing a display.

I read years go that when they filmed mosquito squadron had to drain water out of the wings as they leaked so much.

Avspecs in NZ are the masters at getting them back into the air and the next is rumoured to be UK bound, probably on the US register as Avspecs aren’t CAA accredited.


Sent from my iPhone using TZ-UK mobile app

[Wimm]

Thank you for the history lesson. I always enjoy hearing about the smaller operations that made up the bigger picture of WWII.

A couple of videos of low level raids on the Netherlands. Balls of steel, looking up at buildings at some points.

The Netherlands being relatively flat was quite handy for operations such as these.