Combat Biplanes of World War II by Peter C. Smith

Author:Peter C. Smith
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Military / Aviation
ISBN: 9781473874251
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Published: 2015-09-30T04:00:00+00:00

The Winter War

Relations between Sweden and Finland, and especially between their air forces, were excellent, and frequent exchanges between aviators and squadron visits had cemented that bond. Of course there was much natural sympathy for their neighbour when the Russians brutally invaded, the feeling also being who would be next on Stalin’s agenda, reinforced when he absorbed Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Public donations were received to aid the Finns and with the money raised there was sufficient to purchase both a small number of Gladiator fighters and a few licence-built Hawker Hart bombers.

Following talks between Major Hugo Beckhammar and the Finnish Commander-in-Chief, Marshal Baron Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim at Helsinki, the decision to assist was taken on 15 December, with aircraft ready to operate from 10 January 1940. They were to support the Swedish and Norwegian volunteers on the ground in the general area bounded by Uleåborg (Oulu) – Hossa – Kärkjävi and the base selected was Kemi with the frozen Lake Olkkajärvi, 9 miles (15km) north of Rovaniemi, as advance base ‘Oskar’. The unit flew up on 10 January as planned.

F = Flottielje (Wing) 19, commanded by Kapten Åke Sönderburg, and with Kapten Björn Bjuggren as Executive Officer, fielded twelve Gladiators (with eleven pilots), which represented a big investment for them as this was about 33 per cent of the Flygvapnet’s existing fighter strength at the time. These Gladiators saw action against the Soviet Air Force from January 1940 for a period of sixty-two days, flying on no fewer than sixty of them despite icy conditions, which on occasions rendered their guns inoperational, aiding Finland on the northern front. A few were fitted with ski landing gear and some had under-wing ordnance racks capable of carrying eight small bombs.31 The Gladiators featured the ‘Skull and Crossbones’ pirate symbol on either side of their fuselages with yellow aircraft letters on their rudders.

The F19’s first taste of battle occurred on 12 January when nine Gladiators flew from Kemi to ‘Oskar’ from where four of them escorted the four Harts on a bombing attack against Soviet forces west of Märkjärvi before attacking a Soviet air base nearby and claiming to have destroyed three Polikarpov I-15s but three of the four Harts were also lost. The Gladiators were dispersed to both ‘Oskar’ and a second advance base, ‘Ulrik, at Uleåborg with a third, ‘Svea’ near Posio, as a reconnaissance base. Two more Soviet fighters were brought down on 17 January. A second SB bomber was brought down over Oulu on 1 February and a large TB-3 four-engined bomber was forced to crash-land on 10 March. Three of the Gladiators were lost, serial 274 in air combat on 23 January, when Second Lieutenant John Sjoquist was killed; a second crashed near Uleaborg on 20 February while a third was lost on a test flight on 10 March when Engineer-Lieutenant Ake Hildinger was killed, these latter two were serials 284 and 285

With the end of the war on 13 March the unit ceased operations and

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