Battle of Britain

At sometime in your life, you may have half listened to somebody rambling on and on about their achievements and exploits. Just occasionally, I could interrupt to say that I had flown an ME 109 in the Battle of Britain – not many could beat that.

My summer of 1968 was spent with Spitfire Productions, the company set up by the makers of the original James Bond series of films. My small role involved looking after the radio equipment in the aircraft collection including Spitfires, Hurricanes and on-loan ME 109s from the Spanish Air Force.

  • Flying in the back of a twin seater Messerschmidt to sort out an interference problem

  • Sitting in the left hand seat of the B25 used as the main filming platform while the real co-pilot, a crop sprayer in another life, frightened the life out of Marseilles during a Sunday afternoon engine test.

  • Driving from Duxford down the A20 with a boot full of air traffic equipment in order to set up & welcome in a group of Spitfires & Hurricanes to RAF Hawkinge.

  • Flying from Le Touquet to Bordeaux in the B25 with a valid flight plan, followed by Spifires and ME 109s wondering why nobody on the ground would talk to us. This was the summer of '68 in France after all.

Just a few of the memories that all came about because I ignored that famous RAF motto:

Never volunteer.

Alan Marshall

PS

No newsreel footage or computer graphics were used in the film. All the dogfights were re-created & filmed either from a helicopter (using a then new anti-vibration camera mount) or from several filming bays in the B25 code November six-five-seven-eight-Delta.

PPS Michael Caine was in my film but not many people know that