From the hasty implementation of the French program of underground and armored factories in 1939 to the return to service of German planes abandoned at the end of the war, including the Focke-Wulf 190 fighter repair centers in France busy, this multi-faceted book makes you discover an unusual aeronautical history partly related to the village of Cravant and its quarries located south of Auxerre.
A technical history of the hundreds of Fw190s revised under occupation in the centers of Villacoublay, Tours and Cravant before being reconditioned in NC900 after the liberation. But also a human story, embellished with many testimonies, men and women French, German, Spanish or Russian who were embarked by will or by force in this adventure.
You will discover the production of the NC900 in the underground Cravant factory and their operational use amidst political and ideological struggles, as well as the history of the units that employed them in the confused years of the post-war period. Like the famous Normandy-Niemen regiment where these "Focke hunters" with cockades rubbed the Yak-3 during a period of disappointment, between the triumphant return of the USSR and the transfer to North Africa in the late forties.
This book is based on reports of epochs and archival documents, as well as on the many testimonies collected and intersected during twenty years of research and sometimes surprising encounters.
480 illustrated pages of more than 870 photos (including a complete photoscope of the last surviving NC900 for model builders!), about twenty cards and about forty shots without forgetting the 26 color profiles and 5 detailed profiles of Vincent Dhorne. With the participation of François IGLESIA.
Author(s): René Bouvier-Belleville/Philippe Couderchon
Publisher: LeLa Presse
Pages: 480
Language:
FRENCH!
Edition: unchanged reprint June 2021
Year of publication: 2018
Dimensions: 29,7 x 21 cm
Binding: Hardcover
Weight: 2.00 kg