No.309 (Polish) Squadron 1940-1947 Book Review

By Michael Benolkin

Review

Phil Listemann is a publisher from southwestern France that specializes in interesting historical monographs examining individual RAF squadrons during World War II. These titles are well done and come from a direction that is overlooked by similar publishers these days, from the aspect of the people involved.

In this title, the author take a look at 309 Sqn, one of a number of squadrons that were formed from pilot volunteers that were refugees from European countries overrun by the Germans. 309 Squadron was an interesting example of this composition as most of these pilots were had flight experience prior to the war, but most were in support of ground army operations. 309 Sqn started off training its pilots to conduct reconnaissance and liaison flight support equipped with the Westland Lysander, but these gave way to early Mustangs. By mid-1943, 309 Sqn was transferred to Fighter Command and received later mark Mustangs. While this squadron didn't accumulate a large air-to-air kill tally, it did score three aerial Me 262 kills in one day.

The author uses his existing format for providing a concise combat history for each unit followed by data tables listing the combat victories and losses by unit. The title is illustrated with period photography of men and machines and supplemented with 12 color profiles of their Lysanders and Mustangs in squadron colors and markings.

This is another useful title for the aviation historian and modeler alike.

My sincere thanks to Phil H. Listemann for the review sample.