Bf 109F-4 flown by Franz von Werra of Stab. II/Jg 3 on September 5, 1940. On this day, he was forced to ditch this aircraft in a field near Kent and was taken prisoner. His Emil was examined and well documented by the British. Although one element is still up for debate in my mind - the color of the spinner base plate. Being that the spinner cap is segmented in black and white quarters, mimicking the crest of II/JG 3 seen on the fuselage sides, I elected to use red. RLM 70 black-green is also a possibility since that is the factory applied color to the spinner assembly.
Other variations of this plane's paint scheme commonly seen in artist depictions of this plane are less debatable. The engine cowling is not white on the sides and bottom, even if it appeared so in some over exposed photos. Photos taken in France before this planes final mission show that in reality that it is optical illusion caused by a replacement gun cover that has slightly darker variation of RLM 65 light blue paint on the sides. A similarly painted oil tank cover is seen under the forward nose. The only actual white painted markings were the rudder and wing tips, an experimental IFF measure. 8 bars for aerial victories with 5 down-pointing arrows for ground kills are painted on the tail fin.
Franz von Werra was able briefly escape captivity in England three times, nearly stealing a Hawker Hurricane on the 3rd attempt. He was then moved to a prisoner camp in Canada in January 1941, where he escaped from the prisoner train in Ontario and made his way to upstate New York in then-neutral America. He was able to be repatriated to Germany in time to take part in the invasion of the Soviet Union, now commanding I/JG 53. He scored 11 kills in Russia before his unit was rotated back to the Channel Front in August 1941. On September 20th, he was lost after suffering engine failure in his 109F-4, crashing into the North Sea.
