WOW350 Messerschmitt Me 109 ‘Von Werra’

Description

The Messerschmitt Bf 109 was designed by Dr. Willy Messerschmitt, who it could be argued transformed aircraft design around the world for a generation. Messerschmitt helped Germany rebuild its Luftwaffe and enabled it to become one of the most potent air forces in the world. The initial prototype first flew in 1935, powered by a Rolls Royce Kestrel V12 liquid cooled engine. The wing was a low wing monoplane design that housed a narrow track retractable landing gear using spring loaded edge slats and manually activated trailing edge flaps. In other words this design allowed the aircraft to fly at high speed whilst retaining low airspeeds required for take-off and landing. Our latest version is a Bf 109E and was the first model to be powered by a Daimler Benz DB601A engine with a rating of just under 1,100 horsepower. The Bf 109 undertook many further improvements as the war progressed with over 30,000 being built, it soldiered on until the final days of WW2 and was flown by many of Germany’s top aces including Galland and Hartmann.

Our machine is one flown by Baron Franz von Werra, an Ace and recipient of the Knights Cross. Von Werra is best remembered for being ‘the one that got away’, in that he was the only German pilot to escape from Allied custody during WW2. Initially captured after bailing out over England in 1940 von Werra tried to escape as often as he could but was always recaptured. The Allies shipped him to Canada but he jumped from his prison of war train and made his way from Canada over the border to the USA which at the time was still neutral. The British and Canadian authorities tried to have him returned but he was smuggled out of the USA and returned to Germany via Mexico, Brazil and Spain. Greeted as a hero of the fatherland by Hitler, von Werra returned to flying duties where he tallied up another 14 kills. However in October 1941 just a few months after his escape, his aircraft crashed into the North sea due to engine failure, his body was never recovered and he was presumed dead.