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| A Big Victory |
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| DESCRIPTION |
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| 16 x 11.5 Inch Collector Size Unframed Lithograph $40.00
On September 18 1944 P-51 pilots of the 375th Fighter Squadron of the 361st Fighter Group based at Little Walden in Essex were assigned the mission of escorting B-17s on a shuttle mission to Russia. The Mustangs would accompany the bombers to the south of Sweden where they would be picked up by an escort of Russian fighters. Urban Drew flying a 51-D named Detroit Miss was one of the USAAF pilots on this mission. Just before breaking off the escort Drew spotted a twin-engine German aircraft flying very low to the water. He broke off with two wingman and went down after the German plane. It turned out to be an He-111 most likely a courier plane from Scandinavia. He opened fire hitting the top gun position circled around and with his second burst set the aircraft afire. It tumbled into the Baltic. As Drew and his two wingman climbed back to altitude to rejoin their flight he looked off to the right and spotted an enormous flying boat moored at a sea plane base on a lake. Drew called to his wingman and said “get lined astern immediately and we will make one pass and one pass only... let’s see if we can burn and sink this mother.” The three Mustangs commenced their attack with the element of surprise to their advantage. The three Mustangs poured about 1200 rounds of 50 caliber ammo into the behemoth and as the third aircraft pulled up black smoke and flames were pouring from the target. It was not until that moment that anti-aircraft batteries opened fire but the P-51s were quickly out of range. During the debriefing it was determined that their target was probably a Blohm and Voss BV-222. Years later in 1974 while Drew was living in London he was contacted by the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) which wanted to do a documentary. It was only then that Drew found out that the aircraft he destroyed at the Bug Seaplane Base on Lake Schaal was actually the BV-238 the largest aircraft to see service in WW II. Development work on the Blohm and Voss BV-238 began in 1940. This was planned to be a very large overseas transport aircraft and was powered by six 1900-HP Daimler-Benz inverted V-12 engines. It would be considerably larger than the BV-222 with a wingspan of nearly 200 feet a height of nearly 44 feet and an empty weight of more than 110000 pounds. Although two other aircraft the Douglas B-19 and the Soviet ANT.20 had longer wingspans the BV-238 was the heaviest and most powerful aircraft developed during WW II. It was during the testing phase of this aircraft at Lake Schall in 1944 that the BV-238 was strafed and destroyed by a flight of three P-51s lead by Eighth Air Force ace Urban Drew. |
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