W.I.P. P-38J from the 474thFG

[oboe]

Assigned to the 429th FS, but I don't know who flew this aircraft.  Joe Baugher's site shows this serial number 44-23661 was a P-38J-25-LO, lost on 25 Aug 44, known as "Black Friday" in the annals of the 474th's history.  On that day, 23 P-38s of the 474th engaged what could loosely be described as a gaggle of German Bf-109’s and FW-190’s in a frenetic, hard fought, swirling dogfight.  Initially engaged in a fight were the odds were 2:1 against them, but their odds of survival got much worse when they were joined mid-battle by another flight of 32-plus FW-190s.  It was a brutal and bloody fight, with the Americans losing 11 of their 23 fighters.

I have no photos of it; just a couple of profiles from books and its also a featured '38 skin in IL-2.   Interesting on this plane, the D-Day stripes on the boom were painted incorrectly, with the black and white being reversed.   

Click image for fullsize version:




Not sure about the shade of blue on the spinners.  The color profiles show them as lighter blue, in IL-2 the skin has them much darker.     


 

[Vraciu]

A real beaut.

[Arlo]

 

[Devil 505]

That's stunning.

[lyric1]

 

[Greebo]

Fantastic looking skin Oboe. Not sure I'd want to base a skin solely on profiles though, in my experience they are frequently inaccurate or in a few cases fictitious. Their artists tend to copy off each other too, so several based on the same aircraft does not mean much.

[oboe]

Thanks guys.   Very tough to find helpful photos of the P-38s in the 474th.   They don't appear to have a unit history available.  I think it might be partly due to the fact they sort 'hit the ground running' when they reached the ETO - they were in the thick of things after the invasion, moved to France and did a variety of missions, esp. ground support, while sleeping under canvas.   They typically flew two missions a day when weather permitted.   I imagine life near the front was pretty hectic for them compared to pilots who stayed based in England.

Surprisingly, I haven't even been able to find a decent full image of "SWAT" - Lt Robert Milliken's aircraft, who was the last P-38 pilot to make Ace in the ETO.   You'd think that achievement would give him some measure of fame and interest!

I continue to search for backing photos of 7Y-Y, but have only found a couple more color profiles.  They all seem to indicate lighter blue trim for spinners, but as you say, they may all be based off of the first profile created...

[lyric1]

Thanks guys.   Very tough to find helpful photos of the P-38s in the 474th.   They don't appear to have a unit history available.  I think it might be partly due to the fact they sort 'hit the ground running' when they reached the ETO - they were in the thick of things after the invasion, moved to France and did a variety of missions, esp. ground support, while sleeping under canvas.   They typically flew two missions a day when weather permitted.   I imagine life near the front was pretty hectic for them compared to pilots who stayed based in England.

Surprisingly, I haven't even been able to find a decent full image of "SWAT" - Lt Robert Milliken's aircraft, who was the last P-38 pilot to make Ace in the ETO.   You'd think that achievement would give him some measure of fame and interest!

I continue to search for backing photos of 7Y-Y, but have only found a couple more color profiles.  They all seem to indicate lighter blue trim for spinners, but as you say, they may all be based off of the first profile created...

Only ever found one book on this group and I never could figure out if it has images in it because no one has ever given a good description of what is in the book. Facebook has plenty of good information. No photos though of this plane.There is one crashed Y tailed coded and that was shot down by ground fire.

[oboe]

Found another image, this one a oil? painting by artist WIlliam S Phillips called "Splitting a Pair":

https://www.aviationarthangar.com/splitting-a-pair.html


Unfortunately, it doesn't help with determining the spinner color, however I think 7Y-Y must be the subject of the most images I've encountered of an a/c without finding any reference photos.  I really like the reversed D-Day stripes on the booms, and can imagine how this might've happened.

Here's a colorized photo that looks like it could be 7Y-W from the same squad, showing blue trim, though it was a choice made by whoever did the coloring. 

[lyric1]

Some of my books have differing squadron colours listed.
Except the 429th all say red.











To add more confusion the plane in question looks a little different to the profiles and colour charts. 



 

[oboe]

Lyric!  You are consistently amazing.  That photo helps alot.   It verifies the D-Day stripes were in fact incorrectly applied to the booms - reversed the black and white stripes.  We know the nose was not fully colored (may still have had the tip done).   

The documentation is conflicting, as you say.  "7Y" and the black triangle go together, but is the trim red or blue?   And does the triangle indicate 429th or 428th?   I believe it means 429th, as I know from other photos the 428th's tail symbol is a square.  So the color profiles I've seen could all be wrong, and the color should be red not blue.

[lyric1]

Lyric!  You are consistently amazing.  That photo helps alot.   It verifies the D-Day stripes were in fact incorrectly applied to the booms - reversed the black and white stripes.  We know the nose was not fully colored (may still have had the tip done).   

The documentation is conflicting, as you say.  "7Y" and the black triangle go together, but is the trim red or blue?   And does the triangle indicate 429th or 428th?   I believe it means 429th, as I know from other photos the 428th's tail symbol is a square.  So the color profiles I've seen could all be wrong, and the color should be red not blue.

Also the serial number is visible with two different colours for the numerals.

[oboe]

Also the serial number is visible with two different colours for the numerals.

Do you mean it appears the serial number was stenciled onto the outside tail surface, and the black triangle was applied over that, leaving part of the serial number visible?

[lyric1]

Do you mean it appears the serial number was stenciled onto the outside tail surface, and the black triangle was applied over that, leaving part of the serial number visible?

Due to my scanner picking up the dot matrix as it has. I was seeing what I thought was bare metal parts of the serial inside of the triangle. Taking a photo with my phone it looks different the black of the serial seems to bleed though though on the triangle and you can just make out the last digit sticking up on the bare metal just above the triangle.

[oboe]

Fencer sent me some great resources (thank you, Fencer!) that help a lot.   Haven't been able to look through them all yet, but this YouTube video was very helpful:



Some color screen captures of another P-38 in the same squad:







These color images clearly show the "7Y" designation goes with the black triangle and blue spinners.  Although I saw all three squads by tail symbol (square, triangle, circle), I didn't see any red spinners - just blue, yellow, black, and some unpainted spinners.