Roy Sutherland - Modelling the De Havilland Mosquito

My shooting war began in August 1940 when I joined a Wellington squadron in Bomber Command and quickly found myself attacking the German barges concentrating in the ports along the Channel Coast in preparation for the invasion of our country. It was a grave moment in English history. After the RAFs victory over the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain, Bomber Commands attention was directed against the German heartland and I took part in attacks on a variety of targets including Berlin. My tour of ops ended in the spring of 1941 and I was then posted to a Wellington Operational Training Unit as a flying instructor.

J. R. Goodman in December 1944 as Flight Commnder of No. 16 (Mosquito) OTU, RAF Barford St John, Banbury, Oxfordshire.

In September 1943 I returned to front-line duty, this time on the DH Mosquito. I joined a newly formed squadron (No. 627) at Oakington, near Cambridge. There was only one squadron in residence (No. 7, Lancasters) and the heavy boys promptly called us The Model Aeroplane Club, a name we wore with increasing pride as time passed.

The Mosquito was a dream to fly. Powered by two Rolls-Royce Merlin engines, the Wooden Wonder was like a scalded cat. She was instantly responsive to the slightest control movement and had to be handled gently. Woe betide the pilot who pushed and pulled the controls; the Mossie would quickly bite him. On one engine she could be trimmed hands and feet off and would maintain a high cruising speed as my navigator and I discovered one February night in 1944 when our superb steed brought us home from a spot deep inside Germany with one prop feathered.

No. 627 Squadrons task was low-level visual target marking for Bomber Command. I took part in many heavy attacks on German targets and also in pinpoint marking of targets in France during the period leading up to Operation Overlord, the invasion of Normandy in June 1944. When my tour ended I was posted to the Bomber Command Mosquito Training Unit where I was able to teach new Mosquito pilots the finer points of flying the Queen of the Air. This was a time of great happiness and achievement for me.

I retired from the RAF in 1976 and my wife found an Airfix model Mosquito for me, which I appreciated highly. It was a Mk. IV bomber, but it was a very special one DZ353 which was on 627 Squadron throughout my second tour of operations and which I flew twice each time to Berlin. DZ353 was eventually shot down over France in July 1944 but the model of her occupies an honoured place in my house to this day.

Happy modelling to you all.

Group Captain J. R. Goodman DFC* AFC

As war in Europe approached, the de Havilland company seemed ill prepared to assist the RAF as it geared up for combat. The only military aircraft of note the firm had designed in the interwar years was the DH.82 Tiger Moth trainer. But, while it was focusing on the civil market, de Havilland developed an expertise in constructing aircraft from wood that would result in the most versatile warplane of World War II: the DH.98, or Mosquito. Constructed primarily of plywood made from layers of balsa and birch and mounting two Merlin engines, the light-weight Mosquito could fly at over 400mph, and certain variants could reach 42,000ft. This performance was mated to a range of 1,200 to 3,500 miles, depending on the variant. Over 7,780 Mosquitoes were built in Great Britain, Australia and Canada; the plane was used as a bomber, fighter-bomber, night fighter, trainer, high-speed transport, target tug and for special operations.

This record belies the fact that the Mosquito at first failed to interest the Air Ministry. In fact, in 1938, when Sir Geoffrey de Havilland first proposed a wooden high-speed bomber, fast enough to fly missions without an escort, he was turned down by the Air Ministry. Luckily, de Havilland kept at the project. In 1940, after Lord Beaverbrook briefly ordered the project halted, the first Mosquito took to the air, and gradually the RAF began to accept the machine, first for photo-reconnaissance, replacing Spitfires on longer-range sorties; then as night fighters, bombers, fighter-bombers and pathfinders. The Mosquito was used by 101 RAF squadrons and 45 other units, four RAAF squadrons, two USAAF squadrons and one RCAF squadron.

Perhaps no other aircraft of World War II is so closely associated with daring missions. On 30 January 1944, two three-plane formations from No. 105 and No. 139 Squadrons knocked Radio Berlin off the air twice, once just before a speech by Herman Gring and again just as Joseph Goebbels was preparing to speak. In January 1944, No. 140 Wing executed the daring Amiens prison raid, in which low-flying Mosquitoes breached the wall of a prison full of condemned French prisoners, allowing 258 of them to escape. On 11 April 1944, low-level Mosquitoes of No. 613 Squadron struck the Dutch Central Population Registry in The Hague, where Gestapo records were stored. The attack was so perfect that two bombs actually entered the front door of the building, destroying it while causing minimal damage to the rest of the area. On 14 July the Gestapo barracks at Bonneuil Matours was destroyed by Mosquitoes of No. 487 Squadron. On 31 October No. 140 Wing attacked the Gestapo headquarters in Jutland, bombing a pair of buildings at Aarhaus University. On 21 March 1945, a similar operation was undertaken against the Gestapo headquarters located in the Shellhaus in Copenhagen. While the mission was again a success, with a number of Danish prisoners escaping from the bombed building, one Mosquito hit a bridge and crashed into a school. Sadly, the crash and the subsequent mistaken bombing of the burning school caused many deaths among the students. Add to these missions the exploits of the Banff Strike Wing, the pathfinders and the night-fighter units, and the Mosquito has perhaps the most viscerally exciting record of any World War II aircraft.

Mosquito NF Mk. II, DD669, No. 151 Squadron. Not much is known about this aircraft except that it was apparently a night-fighter camouflage experiment. Colours are open to interpretation; those shown being an educated guess. The black camouflage of this NF Mk. II was overpainted, leaving the canopy frames and antenna mast in the original finish. Note overspray on codes and serial. (Jennings Heilig)