Now that I have had a chance to fully digest this event, I gotta share this with you. While in England in June for 100th Bomb Group reunion, I was with Curtis Wilson, Hong Kong Wilson (Pilot, 100th BG), His family, a friend of the family named Maurice Hammond, his family, Ron and Carol Batley, Jan Riddling and Greg Hatzenbuhler.

Turns out Maurice has a T-6 Harvard that he keeps in a hangar at Hardwick (8th Air Force base for the 93rd Bomb Group, Teds Traveling Circus). The hangar is an old Spitfire Hangar from Biggin Hill (the Eagle Squadrons flew mission from there in WW2).

We are all at Half Moon Inn (watering hole for the 351st Bomb Squadron and 349th Bomb Squadron of the 100th BG during WW2), and Curtis turns to me and asks if I want to take his place flying the next day with Maurice. Not in the T-6 but in Maurice's other plane, a restored P-51 Mustang named "Janie", in the colors of the 353rd Fighter Group. Took about a millisecond to say yes. Rain was forecast for the day so I did not get my hopes up and figured I would keep with my previous plans to visit 493rd base at Debach and the 486th base at Sudbury.

Well, on Friday the flying weather was beautiful, so at noon, after visiting Debach for an hour that morning, we high tailed it back too Hardwick airfield. Maurice and Curtis were just returning to base in the T-6 when we arrived. Outside the hangar was the most beautiful P-51 against the English countryside I had ever seen. It could easily of been Summer 1944. After about 30 minutes of sitting around the hangar and talking ,Maurice Hammond turned to me and said 'are you ready'? You kidding, I was born ready.

Maurice strapped me into a parachute and safety harness and went through procedures for bailout in case of trouble. Once both of us settled in, he started that Rolls Royce Merlin Engine and I just sat there taking it all in. We taxied out (grass runway, straight out of Battle of Britain) and Maurice turned us into the wind. A few minutes later, he pushed the engine full throttle and away we went.

Sixty years after the 8th Air Force started operations in England, I was airborne over an old 8th Air Force base in a "Little Friend." I better pinch myself and wake up, this is not really happening! I figured we would just do a few turns of the circuit and land but no, we started going by every 8th AF base we could find. Tibenham, Thrope Abbotts, Eye, Mendlesham, Horham, Debach, Framlingham, to name just a few. I had always wanted to do this since I had seen Roger Freeman's book "Airfields of the Eighth, Then and Now." Once in the air, you realize just how close these airbase's really were to each other. It put into perspective how midair collisions happened due to someone straying out of the flight pattern on takeoff. Once we completed our tour of the bases we returned over Thorpe Abbotts and Maurice asked me if I wanted to BUZZ the Tower? That was a real hard decision, LET'S GO!!!!

One wing-over later, down we went, lower, lower, lower, faster, faster, faster. According to friends on the ground at Thorpe Abbotts, we went by so fast, we had the signature P-51 scream and were pulling contrails off the wing tips. Turns out, the pass was at 400mph and I picked a few weeds out my teeth. We repeated this with another wing over and another pass of the tower followed by a victory roll and another flyby before heading back to Hardwick for a perfect landing. We taxied back to the hangar and I swear that my adrenaline was sky high when I exited that cockpit. I will always be a B-17 man, nothing tops the "Queen of the Skies" but I have a new found appreciation for the P-51 Mustang. Only problem is, I am still picking weeds from between my teeth!

A HUGE Thanks to Maurice Hammond, Curtis Wilson, the 100th Bomb Group Veterans and Families, Jan Riddling, Greg Hatzenbuhler, Ron and Carol Batley and the whole Tower Museum staff and Volunteers, for making this the BEST trip to England yet.!

Talk to you soon my friends,
Michael Faley
100th Bomb Group Photo Archives
100th Bomb Group Historian