'Fighting the Blue' on Ch 12 Yesterday now

[Simpo Two]

message ends

[Eric Mc]

Relies too much on clips from the film Battle of Britain.

[Simpo Two]

Mm but what would you fill the airtime with? Every second of voiceover needs a second of picture...

[Eric Mc]

It is a problem. There are surprisingly few authentic bits of film from the period of the Battle of Britain - and most of those we have seen over and over.

I wish a few more documentaries about some other RAF operations were made. The Battle of Britain and The Dambuster Raids are a bit done to death.

[Simpo Two]

Very true, although they are cherry-picking for a new and dumbed-down audience. I wonder how many know of the catastrophic Maastricht Bridge raid for example?

In fact any mission, fighter or bomber, given adequate material, would make a fascinating programme.

[Eric Mc]

With decent CGI a lot of the other raids and missions could be depicted fairly accurately these days. I enjoy the Discovery series, Dogfights as that is what it does from mainly the US perspective. A similar programme on the RAF or Fleet Air Arm would be great.

How about "Operation Jericho" or the tactics of the Banff Mosquiito Wing or the Blenheim Raiod on Cologne in 1940?

[Yertis]

Eric Mc said:

How about "Operation Jericho"...

goes off to Google "Operation Jericho"...

[perdu]

I'm glad I went and Googled it 'cos there was a good pathe film on a link from it

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=23496


Funnily enough there was a CGI version of Op Jericho on daytime "telly" last week, not too bad either. It was on one of the Discovery type channels…

(Hope it's OK posting these Pathé links"

[Eric Mc]

A CGI film of the Swordish attack on Taranto would be brilliant.

[Simpo Two]

You're picking all the famous ones Eric!

Another one that didn't go so well was the Maastricht raid. (In fact every time we have anything to do wih Maastricht we get shafted...)



While I'm on, everybody says how great the Wellington was, strong geodetic Barnes Wallis yada. But did it do anything famous?

[ClaphamGT3]

May i be struck down for my irreverance but did anyone else watch the part about the ATA - brave and inspiring ladies all - and find themselves thinking "I bet that Diana Barnato-Walker was a bit of a sort in her day"?

[Simpo Two]

ClaphamGT3 said:

May i be struck down for my irreverance but did anyone else watch the part about the ATA - brave and inspiring ladies all - and find themselves thinking "I bet that Diana Barnato-Walker was a bit of a sort in her day"?

Yes, good programme. I met some of the ATA veterans at the Mosquito Museum last month (though DB-W died a few years ago); very bright no-nonsense people. But they marked the programme down a little because it kept banging on about the fact they were women. In their view it made no difference; everybody was doing their bit, men and women alike.

[Eric Mc]

And there were far more men in the ATA than women - a fact that is begining to be overlooked as the emphasis on recent years has been on the girls.

Diana Barnato was the daughter of Wolf Barnato - one of the Le Mans Bently Boys - so she came from a true PH fraternity.

I've always liked this picture -

[ClaphamGT3]

Eric Mc said:

And there were far more men in the ATA than women - a fact that is begining to be overlooked as the emphasis on recent years has been on the girls.

Diana Barnato was the daughter of Wolf Barnato - one of the Le Mans Bently Boys - so she came from a true PH fraternity.

I've always liked this picture -

That is pure porn!

[Simpo Two]

Eric Mc said:

Diana Barnato was the daughter of Wolf Barnato - one of the Le Mans Bently Boys - so she came from a true PH fraternity.

And he got his cash from this chap: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barney_Barnato

BTW your picwas Maureen Dunlop; DB-W is this one:

[Eric Mc]

I wasn't implying that the picture was of Miss Barnato. I posted it up because it was a well known period publicity shot of women ATA at work.

[Tango13]

Another ATA pilot who had a Bently connection was Charles Amhurst Villiers

[Eric Mc]

Simpo Two said:

You're picking all the famous ones Eric!

Another one that didn't go so well was the Maastricht raid. (In fact every time we have anything to do wih Maastricht we get shafted...)



While I'm on, everybody says how great the Wellington was, strong geodetic Barnes Wallis yada. But did it do anything famous?

The Wellington is most famous as a reliable workhorse. Even though it was superseded by the arrival of the later 4 engined heavies, it remained in use throughout the war both as a bomber and in numerous other roles. Indeed, it was only finally retired in the mid 1950s, well after the Halifax and Stirlings had gone - long after its contemporaries - the Hampden and Whitley. I think it was retired only a couple of years before the Lancaster was.