Details
MUSTANGS ON THE PROWL
(Mighty Eighth Edition - 5 Signatures)
by Robert Taylor
Overall Print Size: 35⅞" x 23½"
Edition Size: 250
Secondary Market
Between 3 and 13 September 1944, the 55th Fighter Group flew eight arduous, highly successful, bomber escort missions to Germany for which the group received a Distinguished Unit Citation. Like those the group had flown before, and would fly again and again until the end of hostilities, each mission took them deep into enemy airspace, involved desperate combat with Luftwaffe fighters, and culminated in rapid descent to low level to strafe enemy airfields on the way home. In that ten day period of intense fighting the 55th covered themselves in glory, destroying large numbers of enemy fighters in the air and on the ground, one of their pilots becoming the top-scoring ground attack pilot of the campaign. Long-range combat missions were typical of the assignments flown by the fighters of the 8th Air Force during that period of the air war. Not content with dog-fighting at altitude, when escort duty was complete, the Eighth's aggressive fighter pilots relished the opportunity to hurtle down to tree-top height and, ignoring the inevitable barrage of anti-aircraft fire, shoot up any target of opportunity upon which they could bring their guns to bear.
"MUSTANGS ON THE PROWL" depicts the king of the Eighth's ground attack Aces, Colonel Elwyn Righetti. Flying his P-51D Mustang, the 55th's Commanding Officer of 338 Squadron, already with TWENTY-PLUSS victories to his credit, leads his pilots through the Rhine Gorge, skimming the ancient Castle of Stableck standing above Bacharach, as they seek out enemy targets on their way back to base at Wormingford, England, in the spring of 1945. A classic Robert Taylor edition endorsed with the signatures of Aces who flew and fought the legendary P-51 Mustang in the greatest air war in history and quite simply THE most dazzlingly beautiful depiction of the P-51 Mustang ever done!
In addition to the artist, this print is individually signed in pencil by FIVE P-51 Aces who flew with the 55th Fighter Group in Europe during World War II:
- Major BILL ALLEN
- Colonel GERALD BROWN
- Colonel DONALD CUMMINGS
- Colonel BUD MAHURIN
- Colonel STEVE PISANOS
Comes with a Certificate of Authenticity.
