Why is Nose-Art important to

Canada's Air Force heritage?

Decorating instruments of war predates recorded history and moves forward: prehistoric clubs, Egyptian chariots, Phoenician war galleys, Spartan shields, Grecian helmets, Roman standards, Viking ships, Zulu regalia, American Indian horses and war paint. The list continues through every culture, revealing what anthropologists and psychologists have identified as the human need to personalize, trust, and feel affection for hose implements which deliver him from or to destruction. Certainly the airplane has become the ultimate example to date.

As a veteran Vietnam pilot put it, "I believe that the kind of art we are talking about is deeply related to the very primitive magical notion that, once you have named something you have control over it. Once you name it, you cannot lose any part of yourself to it - you have asserted mastery over it.

To face death of threat of death regularly presents a kind of insecurity many find difficult to deal with emotionally. Going into combat, then, a crewman must retain some 'faith' or emotional security in the impersonal machine, their aircraft, which they hope to control and use, uncompromisingly, to their own ends. By offering the aircraft a mythical identity they are insuring, superstitiously, at least, a partial control or dominance over the most critical part of a crew's environment - the aircraft itself.

Of the 93,844 Canadian personnel in the R.C.A.F. who served overseas in World War II, 17,100 gave their lives for Canada. Of these 12,266 were killed flying on combat operations. Of the 39,000 operations flown by the Royal Canadian Air Force in Bomber Command, 28,000 of these operations were flown by Canadians in the Handley-Page Halifax aircraft. In order for the brave souls of No. 6 (RCAF) Group to fly these dangerous missions night after night, they needed some inspiration to bolster their determination. The application of Nose-Art to personalize their aircraft was one such way for them to inspire, and be inspired by, the leaders in the group.

Sgt. Albert Stanley Prince was a member of No. 107 Squadron Royal Air Force and was the first of ten thousand Canadians killed serving in Bomber Command during World War II. The squadron used this "unofficial" insignia featuring an RAF eagle diving in front of a large "V" for victory. This artwork was painted on aluminum skin from a Bolingbroke (the Canadian built variant of the Blenheim IV) aircraft by Clarence Simonsen.