IWM Duxford

This is a genuine WW2 Messerschmitt Bf109E-3 built at Leipzig in 1939. The aircraft was being flown by Unteroffizier Horst Perez on September 30, 1940 when it was attacked by Hurricanes over Beachy Head, later belly-landing in a field at East Dean, Sussex with only superficial damage. It was taken to the Royal Aircraft Establishment and was later dispatched to the United States and Canada where it was used for exhibition purposes in connection with the 'Bundles for Britain' campaign. At the end of the hostilities it was delivered to the Arnprior Research Establishment in Ontario. The aircraft was subsequently acquired by Peter Foote, an employee of the British Aircraft Corporation, in 1966. By the November of that year, it had been transferred to Hurn airfield, near Bournemouth. Mr Foote painstakingly began the task of conserving the aircraft.

Another view of N3200 from inside the hangar as the doors are closed. The Rolls Royce Merlin III engine is currently out of the airframe. It wears the markings of 19 Sqn.