KITS 08/2019

44-13893, Lt. Thomas P. Smith, 370th FS, 359th FG, East Wretham, United Kingdom, 1945

On April 11th, 1944, Thomas P. ‚Teepee‘ was forced into an emergency landing in his

Thunderbolt at Macau, France. After a short time in captivity, he was reunited with

his unit on September 16th, 1944, by which time they had been re-equipped with

the P-51D Mustang. After some necessary conversion training, he undertook his first

combat sortie in a Mustang on November 21st, 1944, and shot down two Focke Wulf

Fw 190s. His aircraft was as it was delivered from the factory. The green nose was a

characteristic of aircraft belonging to the 359th Fighter Group, and aircraft allocated

to the 370th Fighter Squadron had a blue rudder towards the end of the war. The

yellow inscription on the nose belonged to Smith’s younger sister, Caroline. The aircraft is illustrated here as she appeared in the spring of 1945 prior to the cessation

of operations in Europe. Later, it received blue canopy framing, red exhaust covers,

antennae and red borders to the ETO quick ID markings. The same is the case of the

buzz letters on the bottoms of the wings.

INFO Eduard - August 2019

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