Saluting plane that ruled sky in darkest days

It was the fighter plane that helped save Britain, and a symbol of national resolve. David Behrens tells the story of the Spitfire.

IT WAS by any standards a design classic and an enduring symbol of British resolve in the darkest days of the Second World War.

Even today, the sight of one of the few remaining Submarine Spitfires can stir the emotions of people not born when they first took to the skies.

These pictures from the archive help to tell the story of the short range, high performance fighter plane that helped an outnumbered Royal Air Force achieve superiority over the Luftwaffe.

It was not an easy battle. The first models proved inferior in head- to- head warfare, but RJ Mitchell’s original design made it possible for his successor, Joseph Smith, to upgrade the plane with new engines and armaments.

In 1940, some 2,600 Luftwaffe fighters and bombers were sent to destroy the RAF, which had at its disposal only 640 Spitfires and Hurricanes. Goering thought the Battle of Britain would be over in a few days.

But Britain proved it could build fighter planes faster than Germany, and the Spitfires, with their superior speed and agility, were able to bring down German fighters in vast numbers.

By the end of the battle, exactly 80 years ago, the Germans had lost 1,887 planes and the RAF 1,023.

But the war was far from over for the Spitfire. In the air battle for the strategic base of Malta, the Mark V model proved decisive in gaining superiority and establishing the islands as a supply base for the troops in Africa.

And in June 1944, the Spitfires provided air support for the D- Day landings, with many adapted as fighter- bombers that could attack German ground forces.

The last Spitfires left service in 1955, 19 years after their maiden flight. Of the 20,351 built before, during and just after the war, only around 35 around the world are still flying.

PICTURE: HUDSON/ FOX PHOTOS/ KEYSTONE/ HULTON ARCHIVE/ GETTY IMAGES. SYMBOL OF RESOLVE: From top, an RAF pilot climbing into the cockpit of his Spitfire, circa 1940: workers in the assembly area of an aircraft factory in the Midlands, building Spitfires in 1941; workmen employed in the construction of a Spitfire fuselage in the ‘ stocks’ at a Midlands aircraft factory in 1941; the Spitfire production line at the Vickers Supermarine Works in Southampton in 1940.

PICTURE: FOX PHOTOS/ HULTON ARCHIVE/ GETTY IMAGES. STUNNING IMAGE : A Supermarine Spitfire Mk. Vb, RF- D, which was flown by pilot Jan Zumbach ( 1915- 1986) of the 303 Kosciuszko Polish Fighter Squadron of the Royal Air Force, Second World War, circa 1943. The aircraft bears Zumbach’s distinctive Donald Duck symbol next to the cockpit.

PICTURE: PARKER/ FOX PHOTOS/ HULTON ARCHIVE/ GETTY IMAGES. BATTLING FOR BRITAIN: Pilots of No 19 Squadron, Royal Air Force Fighter Command scramble for a training exercise in 1939 at RAF Duxford airfield in Cambridgeshire; pilots of a British fighter squadron crowded around a Spitfire with their canine mascot.