Question for the USN experts: Hellcat BuNo 70143 "Minsi III"

[JensOle]

I'm doing a paint of maybe the most famous Hellcats of them all "Minsi III" BuNo 70143 flown by Essex CAG David McCambell and I have a question for the USN world war 2 aviation experts here at the forum:

Do anybody have any info about if the Minsi III art and Japanese kill marks were painted on both sides or only the right side? There are many pictures showing the right side with the decals, but none of the left. I know that warbirds flying today and the F6f-5 at the Naval aviation museum are painted with the decal on both sides, but I have never seen any real pictures of Minsi III with it. From what I can understand so does it looks like that many Hellcats only had the kill marks on the right side and I'm wondering if this might have been the case with Minsi III as well.

[TARPSBird]

Jens-Ole, that's a good question. The right side of the Hellcat always seems to be the "public relations photo" side for well-known aces, certainly with David McCampbell and Alex Vraciu. Doesn't look like there are any left-side cockpit pics of Vraciu's aircraft on the internet either. The ace comes back aboard after bagging more kills, parks his aircraft by the island, Navy brass and Public Affairs people come out to shake hands and get photos of the ace holding up X number of fingers for planes shot down on that hop. Ace gets out on the right side because that's where the people are.
I think you could put the "Minsi III" and the kill markings on both sides or just the right side and nobody will dispute you. Personally I'd go with the museum and put them on both sides like Jimmy Thach's and Butch O'Hare's F4Fs earlier in the war.

[gribouil]

Hi JensOle,
that's a very difficult question to answer...I think you should try to contact Barrett Tillman who wrote "Hellcat Aces of World War 2" (Osprey aircraft of the aces No.10).
Cheers,

Stéph.

[JensOle]

Thanks for the replies. I have the Hellcat aces book and it is a nice little publications with good information. Maybe I should try and contact the author.

What I think support the "just on the right side" is that it is kind of strange that no pictures have been taken on the other side at all and that could simply be because it was nothing to show on that side and nothing to use for PR. Minsi III was photographed in several positions and all are from the right side. Hellcats from the mid war period shows kills marks on both sides and there are pictures to show it., therefor it is so strange with Minsi.

The Pensacola Hellcat is of course an argument for that it was on both sides. But it is not the original Minsi and could have been painted wrong or painted with it on both sides as it looks better. Both are a bit strange for a serious museum though. But it would not be the first museum restoration with such errors.

I guess 100% accuracy is difficult to accomplish..

[Mike71]

I have seen a photo of his MINSI II from the left, with markings. Perhaps he carried the preference forward to MINSI III

[TuFun]

Maybe contact these guys, CAF if this is correct as seen in the pics.

"The Southern California's F6F-5 Hellcat is restored in the markings of Cmdr. David McCampbell, USN, Air Group Commander of VF-19 on the USS Essex during WWII."

http://www.warbirddepot.com/aircraft_fighters_f6f5-cafsc.asp

http://www.warbirddepot.com/dbimages/195/195-c-1280.jpg

http://www.warbirddepot.com/dbimages/195/195-g-1280.jpg

[Bomber_12th]

For what it's worth... The CAF Hellcat, painted in the markings of "Minsi III" (and as seen in Ted's post), used to fly with only the name "Minsi III" painted on both the port and starboard sides, while the kill markings were only applied on the starboard side of the fuselage - I believe this to likely be true to the original, and keeping with what I've typically seen with other USN aircraft at the time. In more recent years, however, the kill marking decals have also now been added to the port-side of the fuselage, matching the starboard side, which very likely was done just to make the port-side of the aircraft that much more interesting to look at. (Having looked at tons of photos over the years of the CAF Hellcat, the kill marking decals are constantly flaking off or coming off completely, requiring new ones to be applied - that is the only reason why there just happens to be one less kill marking on the port-side in the second photo in Ted's post above - you can find other photos from other times where that missing one is there but another of the decals is missing, or that all of them are fresh/present at other times.)

[jmfabio]

The following is from an interview of David McCampbell in Bert Kinzey's In detail and scale Vol 49 F6F Hellcat :

The interviewer asks if the name and kill markings are one side or both sides as on Minsi III.

McCampbell answers: "Yes, both the name and the kills were on both sides as they had been on Minsi II. The kills were stickers rather than being painted on. Also I had a "CAG" added in black at some time to the white tail band."

The interview also states that Minsi III was yellow and that the most kills that were on Minsi III was 30.



Hope this helps,

Joe

[Smashing Time]

From Barrett Tillman "Hellcat The F6F in World War II"

http://www.fsfiles.org/flightsimshotsv2/images/2017/10/22/minsi_III_essexf53a3.jpg