Description: NO RESERVE. 1/72 WWII Vickers Supermarine Spitfire Mk.Vb Piston-Engined Fighter, Serial # BL924, Squadron Code "AZ G", Named "SKAGEN Ind.", flown by Pilot Officer Aksel (or Axel) Svendsen, Danish-Piloted Flight, No. 234 ("Madras Presidency") Squadron, RAF, based at RAF Station Ibsley (or more simply RAF Ibsley), Ubsley, Hampshire and operating from RAF Station Tangmere on April 24, 1942 when he was shot down by a German Focke Wulf Fw 190 over France and "went missing". Note that DeAgostini has erroneously applied both the Serial # BL824 and the name "VALDEMAR ATTERDAG" to both sides of the model as well as reflecting these mistakes in a color rendering of the aircraft in flight seen from its port side included in the pamphlet which accompanies the model. How we determined these were mistakes and that BL924 and "SKAGEN Ind." are correct is described in the narrative that follows. For starters, both BL824 and BL924 were Spitfire Mk.Vb aircraft built at the Vickers Castle Bronwich Shadow Plant east of Birmingham, England. Both serial numbers were allocated to that facility's third Spitfire order, which was dated October 24, 1940 and covering construction of 1,000 Mk.IIIs. However, by the time production began in November 1941, the aircraft were built as Mk.Vbs, the first of the thousand being completed as BL231 on November 23, 1491 and the last as BM653 on May 16, 1942. Note that these were not complete series of BL231 through BL999 and BM001 through BM653 but rather 17 blocks of from 20 to 48 aircraft BL Series aircraft with consecutive Serial Numbers within each block for a total of 596 BL Series Castle Bronwich Spitfires and 10 blocks of from 32 to 50 BM Series aircraft with consecutive Serial Numbers within each block for a total of 406 Series Castle Bronwich Spitfires. For clarity, the 37 aircraft in Castle Bronwich's Block BL231 - BL267 was followed by 20 aircraft in Castle Bronwich Block BL285 - BL304 (remember that the first and last numbers in any group of numbers like this are used so that the total in the group is the mathematical difference plus 1). BL824 was in Block BL801 - BL833 and BL924 was in Block BL918 - BL941. A final observation regarding the serial numbers is that 596 BL Spitfires plus 406 BM Spitfires totals 1,002 - suggesting to us that two airframes being built at Castle Bromwich under the October 24, 1940 contract must have somehow been destroyed before delivery, with two more added to the initial contract as replacements. The fact that BL824 as used by DeAgostini was apparently a research error or the equivalent of a typo when the intention was to use the correct Serial Number BL924. That BL824 is wrong is obvious from its own history while BL924 being correct Serial Number for the aircraft represented by the model and SKAGEN Ind being the name it carried is interwoven in the history of the Danish pilots who flew with the RAF during WWII. The practice at the time was for completed British aircraft to be ferried from their factories to Maintenance Units, or MUs, for test and any repairs or adjustments found to be necessary before being turned over to operational squadrons. In this regard BL824 reached No. 39 MU on February 8, 1942 and soon thereafter was transferred to No. 340 (Free French) Squadron. Damaged in a crash landing that March 15th, she was repaired by late April and assigned to Air Service Training, only to be "struck off charge" on May 5th, and allocated for ground-based airframe maintenance and repair training until finally written off on some undetermined date. This brings us to explaining how BL924 and "SKAGEN Ind" are the correct Serial Number and name assigned to the Spitfire represented by the model. During the War in Europe, pilots from many countries occupied by Nazi Germany flew with the RAF in their own RAF "national" squadrons. By mid-1941 the RAF included in its Order of Battle Belgian, Czech, Dutch, French, Greek, Norwegian and Polish squadrons manned by pilots of these nationalities. The usual practice was for the governments in exile, all of which appear to have been based in London, would use funds available to them to provide the necessary aircraft to the respective squadrons - providing for many, if not all, required to equip a squadron. Most such aircraft were Spitfires but some were Hurricanes as well as bombers. These governments in exile also formed "Spitfire Funds" for donations from their nationals in the UK or Allied nations around the world. By the end if the war these funds would total more the 20 Million Pounds Stirling - which was sufficient to purchase almost 10% of the 20,351 Spitfires which were eventually produced. Following Germany's invasion of Denmark on April 9, 1940, the king and government continued to function as a de facto protectorate of of Germany and as such maintained an ambassador in London and not a free government in exile (a state if affairs which continued until Germany placed the country under military occupation on August 29, 1943). Under the circumstances, Free Danes who were in the UK when Denmark was invaded or found their way there after escaping from occupied-Europe who dreamed of establishing a Danish Squadron in the RAF did not have government funds to use for this purpose. Spurred on by formation of the first Norwegian fighter squadron, RAF No. 331 (Norway) Squadron, in the summer of 1941, led to creation of a Fighter Fund Committee to create a Danish Spitfire Fund to raise £65,000 Pounds. This would have paid for the 12 Spitfires to outfit a squadron at their then-current production cost. From late 1941 through early 1942 donations from Danish Communities around the world to the Danish Spitfire Fund came to only £35,574. Half of this came from Danes living in Britain and Northern Ireland with the second largest amount of £6,877 from Argentina, followed by communities in South African and Canada. A significant amount had been expected from the United States but following the US entry after the attack on Pearl Harbor, most Danes living there shifted their giving to US causes and not those associated with their homeland. Unable to fund a full squadron, the Danish Spitfire Committee aimed to establish a flight within an existing RAF squadron. Thus on April 9, 1942 a total of £38,000 was donated to British authorities. Total collections eventually reached £40,972, which was enough to fund construction of 8 Spitfires. Danish seamen serving in the British merchant marine had adopted the motto "Skagen Ind" as the motto for their collections intended for the Danish Spitfire Fund. The term represented the seamen's collective dream of being Inbound ("Ind") to Skagen, or the Skaw / Scaw, which is the northernmost tip of Denmark. As early as November 1941, the newspaper "Fril Denmark" published in the UK reported that "Skagen Ind" had been chosen as the name of a Spitfire. The receipt of the £38,000 had obviously been anticipated by the British Air Ministry because three Spitfires Mk.Vb from Castle Bronwich taken on charge together to No. 4 MU Ternhill on February 16, 1942 would arrive at No. 234 (Madra Presidency) Squadron at RAF Ibsley on April 5 bearing Danish flags and Danish historical names/mottos on their fuselage sides, forward and slightly below their cockpits. These were Serial # BL831 - Squadron Code "AZ K", Serial # BL855 - Squadron Code "AX U" and Serial #BL924 - Squadron "AZ G". That April 10th, a ceremony at Ibsley for Winston Churchill to accept the donation of the three aircraft from the Danish Spitfire Fund. The final issue involves the name/motto carried by BL924. One post-war reference source on markings of World War II aircraft stated that all three of the original Danish Spitfires, identified above carried the name "VALDEMAR ATTERDAG" in all caps - commemorating the Danish King from 1340 to 1375 who played a major role in Denmark achieving independence from the Germanic Principality of Holstein. By way of contrast, the Air Ministry's Form 78 for each aircraft - setting forth their detailed history show that BL831 was named "SKAGEN Ind", BL855 was named "NIELS EBBESEN", after another 14th Danish hero, and BL924 was named "VALDEMAR ATTERDAG". Despite the latter 'official records', photographs of Aksel Svendsen, to whom BL924 was assigned, crouching on the aircraft's wing on April 5 after having flown it from No. 4 MU Ternhill to No. 234 Squadron at RAF Ibsley proudly displaying "SKAGEN Ind" on its fuselage, and of the April 10 presentation ceremony at which Churchill accepted the three aircraft from the Danish Spitfire Fund, BL924 is shown most prominently of the three with both "SKAGEN Ind" and its Squadron Code "AZ G" clearly visible. This clearly bears out that the clerk who have prepared the respective Air Ministry Form 78s had inadvertently switched the names of BL831 (which is recognized today as having been "VALDEMAR ATTERDAG") and BL924. It's interesting to note that a vintage Spitfire Mk.Vb done up to replicate BL924 / AZ G on display in Merston Hall at the Tangmere Military Aviation Museum compounded the error made in BL924's Form 78 by having the aircraft named "VALDEMAR ATTERDAG" instead of "SKAGEN Ind" as it should have been. Unfortunately, the combat career of BL831 and BL924 with Aksel Svendsen at the controls were short-lived. From April 10 -24, Svendsen logged 24 flights in BL234 and five in other aircraft. Then on the 24th, No. 234 Squadron was assigned top cover for six Douglas A-20 Boston (US Havoc) bombers on a raid on the Luftwafte base at Abbeville in Normandy France. They were jumped by Focke Wulf F2 190s form JG 2 flown by more experienced pilots and both BL831 and BL924 were shot down near Berck-sur-Mer, France and Svendsen was killed - euphemistically reported as "went missing". Very nice model with finely-detailed panel lines. Propeller spins. Model comes with 'lowered' and 'raised' landing gear and therefore can be displayed "on the ground" or "in flight" on the stand provided. However, the model is so heavy it can only safely be displayed sitting on its landing gear if these are glued in place. Because the gear can otherwise collapse as well as to minimize our handling of the model when taking our pictures for this listing, we only took the pictures of the model on its stand without attaching any of the small parts that come with it. Model was released by DeAgostini as part of a subscription service in Japan with the accompanying packaging and literature all printed in Japanese. This particular model was released on June 28, 2016 - with the release date printed at the top right corner of the box as 2016/6/28. Note that the packaging consists of a cardboard top and four sides with the accompanying pamphlet forming the bottom and clear plastic wrap holding everything together as a firm "box". As an example of the packaging and information pamphlet which accompanies this model, our last two pictures show the cover of the pamphlet (in Japanese) which accompanies DeAgostini #DAFW05 and that model set in the formed two-part fitted plastic tray which holds it inside the model's box. The pamphlets that come with these models normally consist of 12 pages but that for the first two models in the series - DeAgostini #DAWF01 and #DAWF02 included additional printed materials on the series in general, for a total of 28 pages. Diecast model. DeAgostini #DAWF09. MIB. FOR ANYONE NOT FAMILIAR WITH HOW TO INTERPRET A MODEL'S SCALE, THE MODEL IS 4 7/8 INCHES LONG WITH A 5 7/8 INCH WINGSPAN. THESE ARE EQUIVALENT TO DIVIDING THE LENGTH AND WINGSPAN OF THE REAL AIRCRAFT IN INCHES BY 72. Buyer pays shipping as indicated:(1) US - Free Shipping by USPS First Class Package or Priority Mail to anywhere in the 50 states depending on weight.(2) CANADA - $16.00 US for this 1/43 Scale item; $2.00 US per item for each additional 1/43 or smaller scale item in the same shipment.(3) LATIN AMERICA AND EUROPE - $24.00 US for this 1/43 Scale item; $3.50 US for each additional 1/43 or smaller scale item in the same shipment.(4) ALL OTHER COUNTRIES - $24.00 US for this 1/43 Scale item; $4.50 US for each additional 1/43 or smaller scale item in the same shipment.International shipments will be identified as "Merchandise" on the necessary US Customs forms and the price paid for each model in a given shipment will be used as its declared value. Any duties or other taxes levied on any foreign shipment are to be borne by the buyer.INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING IS BY FIRST CLASS MAIL INTERNATIONAL, WHICH COVERS PACKAGES UP TO 4 LBS IN WEIGHT. BECAUSE THIS MODEL IS RELATIVELY LIGHT-WEIGHT, IT SHOULD BE POSSIBLE TO SHIP A FEW ADDITIONAL MODELS WITH IT AND STILL BE UNDER THE 4 LBS. LIMIT. THE INCREMENTAL SHIPPING AND HANDLING CHARGES FOR ADDITIONAL MODELS WILL VARY BETWEEN $2.00 AND $4.50 EACH, DEPENDING UPON WHERE THE MODELS ARE TO BE SHIPPED.Virginia buyers pay 6.0% Sales Tax. Allow 10 days for checks to clear. EMAIL US TO HOLD ITEMS PENDING ADDING MORE TO THE SHIPMENT.
Price: 28.95 USD
Location: Alexandria, Virginia
End Time: 2024-08-20T17:55:21.000Z
Shipping Cost: 0 USD
Product Images
Item Specifics
Restocking Fee: No
Return shipping will be paid by: Seller
All returns accepted: Returns Accepted
Item must be returned within: 30 Days
Refund will be given as: Money back or replacement (buyer's choice)
Assembly Status: Ready to Go/Pre-built
Period: WWII
Scale: 1:72
Set Includes: Aircraft
Material: Diecast
Year Manufactured: 2017
MPN: DAWF09
Item Length: 4 5/8 in
Subject: Vickers Supermarine
Brand: DeAgostini
Type: Airplane
Year: 1944
Theme: Militaria
Features: FREE DOMESTIC AND REDUCED INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING, Pre-Built and Fully Detailed Display Model, DeAgostini DAWF, DeAgostini 1/72, 1/72 DAWF, DAWF 1/72, De Agostini World War II Warbirds, 1/72 Warbirds
Recommended Age Range: 14+
Country/Region of Manufacture: China
