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When US and German Soldiers Fought Together and Lesser-Known World War II Events

Khalid Elhassan August 25, 2020 35 min

Itter Castle - Battle of Castle Itter — The French Army's former commander in chief, Maxime Weygand, leaving Itter Castle. Agence France Presse

23. Britain’s Other Heavy Bomber

Handley Page Halifax B MK III “Gutsy Girty” of 427 Squadron at Leeming, Yorkshire with crew prior to another night operation. Royal Canadian Air Force

The Avro Lancaster is probably the British Royal Air Force’s best-known strategic heavy bomber of the Second World War. However, it carried the load along with an often-overlooked sister: the Handley Page Halifax. Along with the Lancaster, the Halifax was the mainstay of the Royal Air Force’s Bomber Command, with 6127 built between 1940-1945. Halifaxes were less versatile than the Lancasters, because their bomb bay, divided into three compartments, could not carry huge individual bombs such as the 4000 lb “Cookie” or larger. However, Halifaxes could still carry 14,500 lbs of bombs that individually weighed up to 2000 lbs each.

First flown in 1939, Halifaxes entered service in November, 1940, and saw combat in March, 1941. At Bomber Command’s peak, it had 76 squadrons flying Halifaxes. Halifaxes were also used in Pathfinder units that flew in advance of RAF nighttime bombing raids to locate the targets, then mark them with flares and colored incendiaries for the following bomber streams.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.