Cover of Flown by the Enemy
Volume 1 · in preparation

Flown by
the Enemy

Wartime test reports on captured fighters, 1942–1945. Annotated and illustrated.

When a lost pilot landed on the wrong side, test pilots flew his aircraft and wrote down everything they found. This book prints those reports in full, transcribed from the originals, with the story behind each aircraft and notes that explain what the testers meant.

Large-format paperback and Kindle on Amazon · PDF on Gumroad

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Look inside chapter 1

Swipe or scroll through sample pages.

Chapter 1 opener: the aircraft file
Chapter 1 opener: the aircraft file
The story: 23 June 1942
The story: 23 June 1942
The report, with notes in the margin
The report, with notes in the margin
The Fw 190 cockpit, from the Luftwaffe handbook
The Fw 190 cockpit, from the Luftwaffe handbook
Buttons, not levers
Buttons, not levers
The de-rated engine
The de-rated engine

Contents

1The wrong airfieldFw 190 A-3 MP499 lands in Wales, June 1942
2Catching upThe Spitfire IX against the Fw 190
3Messerschmitt's own verdictFw 190 A-5 against the Me 109 G-1, 1943
4The Thunderbolt at low levelThe P-47 against the Fw 190, 1943–44
5TP814The RAF flies a Bf 109 G-6, 1944
6The other sideGerman pilots in American fighters

Plus a glossary, conversion tables and every source with its archive reference.

What's in each chapter
  1. The story of the aircraft and the people around it
  2. The report, printed in full with notes in the margin
  3. The drawings: cockpits, controls and engines from the original manuals, labelled in English
  4. What the report didn't say: the limits of one test aircraft