THREE KILLS WITHOUT FIRING A SHOT

摘要

By August 1944 Colonel McColpin had already served with three Eagle squadrons, racking up 12 confirmed kills, five probable and 12 damaged, while flying in Hurricanes and Spitfires with the RAF. He had helped mould the 404th Fighter Group into one of the premier Thunderbolt outfits in the European Theatre of Operations during World War Two. However, McColpin had been ordered to stay on the ground as he was too valuable to risk getting killed or shot down. He found a way around this by going off on solo missions that were carefully disguised in the daily operations reports. On August 27 he was flying solo at a very low altitude of around 50ft (15m) near Coulommiers, in France, when he was jumped by four Fw 190s. It was a very tricky spot to be caught in as the Jug's strength was not in air-to-air combat close to the ground!