We Found my Dad's old Hurricane - in the Science Museum

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My Dad, Edgar Dunster, was ground crew for 615 Squadron at RAF Kenley during the Battle of Britain. 

During the mid to late 1970s we were on a family holiday and visited Torbary Aircraft Museum. My Dad froze and became very emotional, pointing at a Hawker Hurricane and said, "That's my aircraft!"

He was insistent! Apparently

"You never forget your aircraft's registration number!" 

...presumably because you're always writing it down on some form or other after you've worked on it.

All I can remember is that the Hurricane was in Battle of Britain colours, had the 615 Squadron "KW" markings and that Dad was insistent it was his. I did take a photo of it for him but I've no idea where that photo is now.

The guy in charge of the museum pricked Dad's bubble when he pointed out the Hurricane was a replica built for the 1966 film Battle of Britain, and was merely painted to look like Dad's aircraft.

You can imagine that Dad was feeling a little deflated but then he perked up when the guy said that the real one was in the Imperial War Museum.

As the years went by, remembering how emotional Dad had got at seeing his old aircraft, I kept suggesting we go to London to find it. My parents had a bit of a phobia about going to London and we never did but I never let go of the idea.

When I was old enough, I travelled to London on my own and visited the Imperial War Museum to try and find his aircraft. Sadly my trip was fruitless.

Years later I discovered that a new aircraft museum was being put together in Duxford near Cambridge and that it was part of the Imperial War Museum. So I figured that maybe his aircraft was there - but sadly not.

The trail had gone cold and Dad died in 1981 never having seen his aircraft.

After he died I got married and had two wonderful children and thought nothing more of Dad's old aircraft.

In 2014 I started a Battle of Britain Twitter account called @BofB1940 as a summer project with my eldest son (Kit) to teach him something of the workings of social media.

Using Battle of Britain records and history books I'd collected over the years, Kit and myself put together a real time Twitter feed for the Battle of Britain as if it was happening now.

Spurred on by the unexpected success of @BofB1940, Kit started avidly consuming Battle of Britain reading material. His eye was drawn to one article that I'd never read, about the Hurricane in the Science Museum.

Kit asked me to confirm that Dad's old squadron was 615 which I did.

Apparently when we had visited the Science museum as a family for the first time only months before, the Hurricane we'd seen was actually from Dad's old squadron.

Sadly I had no recollection of the registration number of Dad's old aircraft but I was lucky enough to find information from a Torbay Museum Guide that somebody had put on the Internet: it said

Hawker Hurricane KW-Z (replica for the Battle of Britain film)

This was progress, it told me that what Dad thought his old aircraft had the ident letter Z.

The article that Kit found said that the Science Museum Hurricane had the following markings during its time with 615 Squadron:

L1592   KW-Z

This gave me more information and Google was now able to tell me:

Replica BAPC.63: initially marked L1592 KW-Z; currently marked SD-T located at the Hawkinge Museum, Kent

Looking up the BAPC register, I was able to confirm that BAPC.63 was:

P3208/SD-T Hawker Hurricane (full scale model), Kent Battle of Britain Musuem, Hawkinge - built for the film "Battle of Britain" ex L1592

And for me this was conclusive proof:

• I had Torbay museum records from the Internet telling me what Dad saw was KW-Z. 
• I had aviation forums telling me the replica at Torbay was BAPC.63
• I had the BAPC register saying BAPC.63 was originally marked as L1592 KW-Z
• I had an article saying that L1592 was in the Science Museum and used to be marked KW-Z

So I am guessing when the guy at at Torbay Aircraft Museum said the original was in the Imperial War Museum, maybe he meant the Science Museum - or maybe there was a transfer from one to the other or maybe we weren't listening properly.

We had found Dad's aircraft and it was in the Science Museum and we had all seen it (without realising it was his) only months before.

I'd very much like to take my family back to the Science Museum soon, this time knowing that it was Dad's aircraft...and strangely I'd also like to visit the Hawkinge Battle of Britain Museum to see the exact replica that I stood in front of with my Dad...thinking it was his old aircraft.

Then a further realisation dawned. If L1592 was definitely Dad's aircraft then presumably Dad would have known its pilot.

Dad was at Kenley on 18 August when the aerodrome was bombed and Mum was in married quarters only a few miles away in Whyteleafe.

On that same day, Dad's old aircraft and pilot were up flying in combat. Len Deighton has documented what happened in his book Fighter - The True Story Of The Battle Of Britain:

18 August 1940

Pilot Officer D. J. Looker in KW-Z was at an even greater disadvantage than the rest of 615 Squadron, for his usual aircraft was damaged, forcing him to fly in a Hurricane I, from reserve. It had fabric-covered wings and its fuel tanks were not self-sealing. Worse, from a handling point of view, it had a de Havilland variable-pitch (two-pitch) airscrew instead of a Rotol constant-speed propeller. This meant inferior performance and more work for the pilot.

No. 615 Squadron were still using the old formation (four vees) and were flying tightly together in the pre-war style. Undoubtedly this made them easier to spot. They were bounced out of the sun by the Bf 109s they were looking for, and the tail of KW-Z was hit by cannon shells. The Hurricane went into a spin, but Looker was experienced enough to regain control of it. He was reluctant to bail out, having just spent a month in hospital with leg injuries after a dog-fight during the battles in France. He dodged through the balloon barrage cables that were there expressly to inhibit such flying, and then put the Hurricane down at the first landing field he saw. It was the pre-war London airport at Croydon. As he came in, he ran the gauntlet of the anti-aircraft guns who thought he was a German bomber.

Pilot Officer Looker survived, but incredibly one of the airport officials at Croydon made a written complaint about his airport being used as an emergency landing field. Looker's Hurricane also survived, to become an exhibit at London's Science Museum.

I am of course pleased that Dad's old aircraft still exists but I am absolutely delighted that it was only my son's involvement, the Grandson he never met, that was the key to the whole mystery:

Kit had finally found his Grandad's old aircraft. Something that easily brings a tear to my eye.

by Steve Dunster