Nice Story [Archive]

Bomber_12th

September 30th, 2016, 18:20

Unfortunately, a story is all it is. The owner of the aircraft is knowingly deceiving this vet, and the general public, as there is no proof that this Mustang is the original "Tall in the Saddle", let alone a 332nd FG aircraft at all - it's just purely made-up, and the owner of the aircraft is getting away with it because no one can seem to prove whether it saw combat action or not, let alone any assignment to a particular fighter group (and of course since all of the 332nd FG Mustangs had their tail serial numbers painted over, one would never be able to find a photo of the original "Tall in the Saddle" showing its original serial number, unless of course you came upon a high-quality photo which just happened to show the data block on the fuselage). There is evidence that shows the aircraft was sent to the Mediterranean Theatre, for the 15th AF, but there is no record of it being used by the 332nd FG, or any other fighter group for that matter - for the fact that it survived, having been sent directly back to the US following the end of the war in Europe, likely confirms that it saw little to no combat involvement/flying at all (although George Hardy did only begin flying combat missions at the very end of the war in Europe, the plane that George Hardy flew had already seen quite a bit of action prior to him receiving it, as it had been assigned to a well-seasoned pilot before him - and because of this, the aircraft would likely have had to have been an earlier production "D-model"/serial anyway, to have reached the Combat Theatre and begun combat flying early-enough in the war). Some remains of red paint were found, some years ago, under some fairings/panels around the tail, but there is evidence that this aircraft very likely had a red tail (along with other red markings) during a portion of its time in post-WWII Air Guard/US Air Force use, just like so many others in the 192nd. What has been called "battle damage repairs" on the tail, are just symmetrical patches (same position left/right on vertical fin) where it would have had white position lights mounted in its post-WWII Air Guard/US Air Force days, like so many others. And what a coincidence too, that of the extreme few Tuskegee Airmen pilots left living, that this plane was assigned to one of them(!). As I heard one historian recently write, this is what happens "when owning a P-51 Mustang just isn't enough", and everyone now wants to try and prove that their warbird really did see combat action in WWII, like the very few rare ones that do still exist/fly with clear provenance, so that they too can reclaim the headlines and get greater airshow bookings (there is also another Mustang operator in the UK, who recently claimed on Facebook that their TF-51D is a Korean War vet, when in reality only the identity/paperwork says that - the aircraft itself, that flies today, all originated new from several different shops in the early 2000's, leading to a new aircraft that was completed in 2007, but with an identity attached to it from a Mustang that hadn't really existed at all since the 1950's).

(Ironically, there is a very original and well-documented 15th AF combat-vet Mustang still flying today, which originally served with the 325th FG, for which its particular name/markings/original pilot are known, but it is not painted in its original markings, rather it is painted in fictional 352nd FG/8th AF markings at this time.)