Gunther Rall, who attained 275 confirmed aerial victories, was the third highest scoring ace of all time. In Stans dramatic painting Rall is about to have a mid-air collision with a Lagg-5 during the Battle of Kursk on the Eastern Front. Rall would survive this collision and continue to chalk-up victories until the end of the war. Rall flew about 800 combat missions and missed nearly a year of flying when he suffered a broken back.
Item Code : STK0109
A Costly Victory by Stan Stokes. - Editions Available
In the period following WW I, Americas military spending was severely curtailed. The Air Service of the United States Army, which had performed admirably in the latter stages of the War, was treated like an unwanted child. The Air Service had detractors within the regular Army, the Navy, and the Naval Air Service. Rivalry between the Navy and Army was fierce during these times, and competition for the limited amount of funds available for defense spending further intensified matters. Brigadier General Billy Mitchell was one of the senior officers in the US Army Air Service. A veteran of WW I, Billy was an outspoken advocate of the Air Service. Mitchell requested permission to attempt to sink the German dreadnought Ostfriesland in a demonstration off the Virginia coast. The Navy was anxious to discredit the Air Service, and even within the Army itself there were many rooting against Mitchell. Mitchells commanding officer ordered him to attack the Ostfriesland from a minimum altitude of.........
Print size 16 inches x 11.5 inches (41cm x 30cm) Supplied with signed and numbered certificate of authenticity.
Artist : Stan Stokes
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Canadian Heroes by Stan Stokes.
James Edgar (Johnnie) Johnson was the Royal Air Forces top fighter ace in Europe with 38 confirmed victories during the War. Johnson was called up in 1939 following his training with the RAF Volunteer Reserve. Having been hospitalized for much of the Battle of Britain, Johnsons first serious action was in mid-1941 when he often flew with Douglas Baders section. Johnson was promoted quickly and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross following his fifth victory in 1941. In early 1943 Johnson was put in command of a wing of the Royal Canadian Air Force. Flying the high-performance Supermarine Spitfire Mark IX, Johnson achieved 18 victories in seven months of flying. Many of Johnsons victories were achieved against the Messersmitt Bf-109. Promoted to Group Captain in early 1945, Johnson was put in command of the 125 Wing for the duration of the War. The Supermarine Spitfire is the only Allied fighter to have been continuously produced from before 1939 to after 1945. In total more than.........
Ernst Udet, the German WW I ace who visited America in the late twenties, was so impressed with the U.S. Navys Curtis Hawk divebombers that he ordered one for evaluation and study by German aircraft manufacturers. This led to the development of Germanys first divebomber the Henchel 123. By 1935 the German Luftwaffe was developing its first monoplane divebomber which entered production in 1936 as the Ju87 Stuka. The Stuka was to evolve into arguably the most successful single engine Axis divebomber of WW II. Utilizing a nearly vertical dive position the Stuka was stunningly accurate in the days when horizontal bombing was a relatively inaccurate science. The Ju87 was built for functionality and ruggedness. A fixed landing gear and exceptionally strong wing design were incorporated and no attempt was made to minimize protrusions. The Stuka was not designed for speed; it was an aerodynamic nightmare. The Stuka also incorporated a siren which when activated during a dive was designed to i.........
The grandfather of todays cruise missiles, the Mistel was the piggyback aircraft of the Luftwaffe during WW II. This combination aircraft arose out of research conducted to find a better means for towing gliders into combat. About two hundred of these combinations were ultimately built. The British had experimented with a piggyback combination of a commercial transport on the back of a flying boat in the late 1930s. The Mistel project in Germany had its share of skeptics. As the program evolved and Germanys strategic position in the War eroded, the Mistel project became focused on using unmanned obsolete Ju-88 bombers loaded to the gills with explosives as a very large guided bomb. The top aircraft in the combination, either a Bf-109 or Fw-190, would be piloted into the proximity of the target. A rudimentary guidance system would then be locked on the target, and the unmanned Ju-88 would fly itself into the target. Some Mistel combinations utilized normal looking Ju-88s, whereas other.........
Born in Prussia to wealthy aristocratic parents, Manfred F. von Richtofen, The Red Baron, was to become the top ace of World War I, with 80 confirmed kills, and probably another 40-50 which took place over enemy lines and could not be confirmed. Richtofen was originally a cavalry officer, but with great persistence he was transferred to the air arm. After a brief period on the eastern front Richtofen was transferred to the western front in August 1915. His first confirmed victory was recorded in September 1916 and by November he recorded eleven kills, including Major L. Hawker, the top British fighter pilot at that point in time. With his keen reflexes and eyesight he quickly ascended, and by June 1917 Richtofen took control of a unit near Coutrai. This unit became known as Richtofens Circus. By July the ringmaster had his fifty-seventh victim. Despite his successes Richtofen shunned publicity and became increasingly withdrawn. Richtofen was wounded in combat and spent three weeks in .........
On April 6, 1916 the RFC formed several new squadrons, including the No. 56 Squadron - Scouts. In March of 1917 the unit received the first of its new SE5s. The aircraft was disappointing to the pilots, being slower than expected, and its new Vickers machine gun with interrupter gear was next to useless. Many modifications ensued in the field, and many SE5s were fitted with Lewis guns located atop the upper wing, and in some cases an additional Lewis was installed which could be fired downward through the cockpit. In early April of 1917 No. 56 was ready to see its first combat action, and the unit headed off to France. About nine months earlier the pendulum of air superiority had swung back to the Germans. The Fokker scourge of 1915 had previously been negated by the deployment of DH2 and FE8 aircraft, but the newer German Albatros and Halberstadt fighters had regained the upper hand. The RFC was once again suffering unsustainable casualties. No. 56 Squadron was immediately pressed in.........
Print size 16 inches x 11.5 inches (41cm x 30cm) Supplied with signed and numbered certificate of authenticity.
Artist : Stan Stokes
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The Fokker Scourge by Stan Stokes.
Anthony Herman Gerard Fokker was born in the Dutch East Indies in 1890. When his father retired the Fokker family returned to Holland, where Anthony attended school. He dropped out of college, and being deemed unfit for military service, worked at a number of odd jobs. Fokkers father persuaded his son to attend an automobile mechanics school in Germany, but Anthony was disappointed and convinced his father to enroll him in a school near Mainz which offered courses in aircraft construction and flying. This endeavor was not particularly successful, and Anthony decided to build his own flying machine. He found a partner in Oberlieutenant Von Daum, a fifty-year-old officer in the German military. The aircraft was completed in 1910, and Fokker flew it successfully on a number of flights. Von Daum, unfortunately, destroyed the machine on his first attempt at flying it. The two partners then teamed with a boat-builder to construct a second aircraft. In early 1912 Anthony had organized Fokke.........
William Avery Bishop, the top scoring RFC ace of WW I, was born in Ontario Canada on February 8, 1894. He entered the Royal Military College in 1911 and after War broke out in Europe he was assigned to the 14th Battalion of the Canadian Mounted Rifles. Bishop applied for a transfer to the Royal Flying Corps in 1915. Following a few months of training he was made an observer and was sent to France to fly with No. 21 squadron. He was hospitalized for frostbite and later from injuries sustained in a bad landing. In late 1916 he began pilot training and in March of 1917 Bishop was posted to No. 60 squadron flying Nieuport Scouts. On March 25 he experienced his first air combat, downing an Albatros single-seater. Bishop scored thirteen victories during Bloody April, and another seven-and-a-half in May. He was awarded the DSO at this point. In early June Bishop attacked a German airfield at dawn, and shot down three Albatros aircraft taking off to challenge him. For this fete he received th.........
Hitlers Operation Barbarossa was designed to destroy the Red Army utilizing huge battles of annihilation along a wide front. The plan failed for several reasons, one of which is the fact that they never gained complete air superiority over the Red Army, which showed an amazing ability to produce huge numbers of aircraft despite the destruction of many production plants. Generally speaking, public awareness and information regarding the air war in Russia during WW II is negligible in America. One of Mother Russias greatest pilots was Ivan Kozhedub, and one of its most effective aircraft was the La-7 fighter. S.A Lavochkin teamed with V.P. Gorbunov in 1938 to design and develop a new Soviet fighter. The specification called for a simple, easy-to-build aircraft, which could be built quickly in very large numbers. The design was required to utilized no alloys which might be scarce in a wartime economy. Late in 1940 the La GG-1 prototype was delivered. Although a bit slower than its Mig an.........
Commissioned on August 24, 1940, the German battleship Bismarck was the epitome of naval power. The great ship was 823 feet in length, had a beam of 118 feet, and a displacement of 50,000 tons. After nine months of sea trials the Bismarck embarked on its first mission accompanied by the cruiser Prinz Eugen on May 19, 1941. The Bismarcks mission was to destroy and disrupt convoys carrying war relief supplies to Britain from North America. On May 20th the Bismarck was spotted and reported to British intelligence as it passed through the narrow straits between Denmark and Sweden. The British presumed correctly that the Bismarck was headed for the North Atlantic, but by which route? Dividing its naval forces in an attempt to intercept the mighty German battleship, four ships were sent to patrol the Denmark strait, including the newly commissioned battleship Prince of Wales, and the H.M.S. Hood, a heavily armed battle cruiser, pride of the British fleet. On may 23rd the Bismarck was spotte.........
Arguably the best brother team of two fighter aces was Manfred and Lothar von Richtofen, with 120 WW I aerial victories between them. Manfred, who became known as The Red Baron, was the top ace of WW I and his reputation is still alive and well today thanks to movies and books. The Richtofen family was minor nobility, and Manfred painted the aircraft he flew in the squadron he commanded bright red – hence the name Red Baron. Manfred was born in Poland in 1892, and was sent to military school at age eleven. When WW I commenced Manfred, commissioned as a lieutenant, initially served in the cavalry. He became enthralled with aircraft while watching planes perform aerial reconnaissance missions. In 1915 he attended flying school, and was first assigned as an observer to a bombing squadron. Inspired by the exploits of the famous ace Oswald Boelcke Manfred put in for pilot training. He passed the pilots test on his third try. He was fortunate to fly with Boelcke in Jasta 2, a unit of promis.........
By the Spring of 1917 the Western Front had been stalemated for more than two years with the armies of Germany and the Allies deadlocked in static trench warfare. At sea, the fleets of both Germany and Great Britain were also at a strategic impasse following the inconclusive Battle of Jutland in 1916. The unrestricted U-Boat campaign in the Atlantic had resulted in Americas entry into the War, and Germany turned to its fledgling air force to help break the deadlock. Night raids by Zeppelins in 1915 and 1916 had proven ineffectual as the great airships had proven vulnerable to the unpredictable weather and to increasingly effective defenses. A new strategic weapon would therefore be utilized - the heavy bomber. With a fleet of such airoplanes, the very heart of London could be attacked. In March of 1917 a new unit was formed in Flanders, soon to be known as the England Geschwader. Lead by Hauptman Ernst Brandenburg, Kaghol 3 (the units official designation,) was equipped with the Gotha.........
With Europe occupied by Nazi forces, Great Britain was the last obstacle in Hitlers plan to rule Europe. Hitlers invasion plan called for his Luftwaffe to gain control of the air over Britain in the first few weeks of attack, which would be followed by pulverizing bombing attacks on the British coastline, and finally by a blitzkrieg style invasion spearheaded by Panzer Divisions supported by fighters and dive bombers. The Germans had assembled over 100 well-equipped divisions by the Summer of 1940 for its invasion of Britain, and on August 8 the Luftwaffe attacks commenced. The Germans had underestimated the capability of the British air defense and both the will and skill of its pilots. In the first ten days of German attacks RAF Hurricanes and Spitfires shot down 697 German aircraft, while losing only 153 aircraft and 93 flight personnel of their own. By months end the German strategists shifted to all out attacks on British airfields, aircraft plants, and munitions factories. Effec.........
Germany, concerned over the full brunt of Americas entry into the War, decided in 1918 to launch one last all-out offensive. Germanys air forces were to play an important role in this offensive, but production of new aircraft had lagged behind expectations. With insufficient numbers of aircraft, German military leaders had to hope for technically superior machines to offset their disadvantages in numbers. In early 1918 top aces were brought back from the front to test competing designs. The overall favorite was a Fokker design which would ultimately reach the front as the D.VII. The aircraft was ordered into production immediately. The Germans organized a couple more fighter groups which could be rapidly deployed in those area where they could do the most good. The German offensive, which is generally referred to as the Kaisers Battle, began in the Spring and was focused on the area north of the Somme. British forces were initially overwhelmed by the German offensive. German airpower .........
The Lockheed P-38 Lightning, called the Fork-Tailed Devil by Luftwaffe pilots in Africa, was one of the largest fighter aircraft to see service during WW II. Flight-testing of the YP-38 prototype was completed in 1941. The first P-38s put into service were dedicated to the defense of the West Coast following the attack on Pearl Harbor. In the spring of 1942 plans were laid to deploy P-38s in Europe. By adding drop tanks the maximum range of the Lightnings were increased to a whopping 2200 miles, making ferry trips to Europe possible. All three P-38-equipped fighter groups in Europe (82nd FG, 1st FG, and 14th FG) were transferred to North Africa in late 1942. These P-38 fighter groups were soon seeing serious combat action in the Mediterranean & North African theaters. The experienced Luftwaffe pilots learned that the P-38s should be attacked at altitudes below 15,000 feet, where they had difficulty maneuvering with the Bf-109s they frequently encountered. Despite these limitations the.........
One of the strategies utilized by the German military in WW I was the terror bombing of civilian targets in hopes of swaying popular opinion to permit favorable peace terms to be exacted. While this strategy was flawed, the principal instrument utilized in its implementation early in the War was the dirigible. While dirigibles had the range to hit targets in Britain, they became increasingly vulnerable to attack as fighter aircraft and ammunitions performance improved. One of the most successful developers and builders of these dirigibles was Count von Zeppelin. Zeppelin was a visionary in airship and aircraft design, and by the time WW I had begun his interest had largely shifted from lighter-than-air airships to more conventional aircraft designs. Zeppelin was well aware that his giant dirigibles had severe limitations in a military role, including their large size, slow speed, small payload capacity, and most important their high flammability. What was needed was a conventional air.........
In mid-1941 Germany invaded the Soviet Union opening up a second front. Despite its own wartime shortages, the UK realized a moral obligation to send supplies to the USSR. In August of 1941 the first convoy (designated PQ1) sailed from Iceland to the Arctic ports of Archangel and Murmansk. By mid-1942 12 convoys had set sail, with the loss of only merchantman out of 103 that had set sail. Admiral Raeder pressed Hitler for permission to move anti-convoy forces, including the battleship Tirpitz to northern Norway. With these forces in place, PQ16 lost five ships in May of 1942. When PQ17 assembled in Iceland in late June, an impressive force of Cruisers, Destroyers, and Corvettes was assembled under the command of Rear-Admiral Hamilton to provide close-in support. In addition, a battlefleet under the command of the Admiral of the Fleet, Sir John Tover, would shadow the convoy. The Admiralty was fearful of the Tirpitz and believed that if encountered the convoy would scatter and make a r.........
In 1941 the advancing German forces had obliterated the Soviet Air Force. During the first week of fighting the Luftwaffe had destroyed more than 4000 Soviet aircraft. Huge numbers of aircraft were destroyed hopelessly on the ground, and those that took to the sky were often outclassed by superior equipment flown by more experienced pilots. The decimation of the Soviet Air Force during the fighting in 1941 was shocking, but even more remarkable is the story of the comeback of the Soviet Air Force. The Soviets had been blessed during their history with many excellent aviation designers and engineers. Zhukovsky, Sikorsky, Tupolev, Polikarpov, Mikoyan, Lavochkin, and Gurevich to name but a few. The Germans smashed the pride the nation had in its Air Forces, but the Soviets fought back. Most of the Soviet fighters at the start of the War were obsolete Polikarpov I-153s or I-16s. Some Mig 3s were available, but the Mig 3 was a poor performer at low altitudes, and was too unstable and too l.........
On November 2, 1936 the keel was laid for a new German 35,000 ton-class battleship. On April 1, 1939 the new ship was christened the Tirpitz, and by February of 1941 the giant ship had entered service. The hull of the Tirpitz was 90% welded, and the battleship was very heavily armored, rendering it almost unsinkable in the minds of German naval strategists. In service the Tirpitz actually displaced closer to 53,000 tons. With a crew slightly in excess of 2,000 the ship was capable of making 29 knots. With a range of more than 9,000 miles at a speed of 16 knots, the Tirpitz was certain to take a heavy toll on Allied shipping in the North Atlantic. The Royal Navy and RAF determined that the Tirpitz must never be allowed to become an effective convoy buster, and a multi-year campaign of harassment of the huge German warship was undertaken. In July of 1940, while the ship was still being outfitted, an air attack was launched with little significant damage. After completing its sea trials .........
Print size 16 inches x 11.5 inches (41cm x 30cm) Supplied with signed and numbered certificate of authenticity.
Artist : Stan Stokes
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A Pistol Whipping by Stan Stokes.
There were tens of thousands of aerial combat encounters during World War II. One of the most unusual was a dogfight that took place between Captain Arthur C. Fiedler, Jr. and an unidentified German Bf-109 pilot on June 28, 1944. Fiedler was an Illinois native who received his wings in July 1943. He was assigned as a flight instructor in Dover, Delaware, but in May 1944 he was assigned to the 317th Fighter Squadron of the 325th Fighter Group. Flying P-51B Mustangs the 317th was based in Lesina, Italy. Fiedler named his Mustang after his wife Helen. On a combat mission on June 24th Fiedler claimed a probable. Four days later the eventual ace was flying near Polesti, Rumania when a Bf-109 crossed directly in front of his aircraft. Slamming his P-51 into a near vertical bank he trailed the 109 for a few seconds attaining several hits before his guns jammed. As Fiedler rolled out of his bank he found himself flying in formation parallel to the 109, and headed towards Russia. Fiedler was n.........
