Portal:World War II/Equipment/8

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Supermarine Spitfire was an iconic British single-seat fighter used primarily by the RAF and many Allied countries through the Second World War and into the 1950s.

Produced by Supermarine, the Spitfire was designed by the company's Chief Designer R. J. Mitchell, who continued to refine the design until his death from cancer in 1937. Its elliptical wing had a thin cross-section, allowing a higher top speed than the Hawker Hurricane and other contemporary designs; it also resulted in a distinctive appearance, enhancing its overall streamlined features. Much loved by its pilots, the Spitfire saw service during the whole of the Second World War and subsequent years, in all theatres of war, and in many different variants.

More than 20,300 examples of all variants were built, including two-seat trainers, with some Spitfires remaining in service well into the 1950s. Although its great wartime foe, the Messerschmitt Bf 109, in its many variants, rivalled the Spitfire's production statistics, the Spitfire was the only British fighter aircraft to be in continual production before, during and after the Second World War.

The Air Ministry submitted a number of names to Vickers (the parent company of Supermarine) for the new aircraft, tentatively known as the Type 300, including the improbable Shrew. The name Spitfire was suggested by Sir Robert MacLean, director of Vickers at the time, who called his daughter Ann, "a little spitfire." The word dates from Elizabethan times and refers to a particularly fiery, ferocious type of person, usually a woman. The name had previously been used unofficially for Mitchell's earlier F.7/30 Type 224 design. Mitchell is reported to have said that it was "just the sort of bloody silly name they would choose", possibly an oblique reference to an earlier, much less successful aircraft of his design that had been given the same name.