Recognition Pictorial Manual. War Department FM 30-30. Navy Department Buaer 3. Restricted
United States: Department of War, April 1943. Field manual in original string tied card case, measuring 153 x 280 mm., approximately 100 internal sheets. Very well preserved example. An illustrated aircraft recognition handbook issued by the United States Army during the Second World War. The internal sheets are dated April 1943, placing the publication well after the entry of the United States into the war, but also significantly preceding the Normandy landings of June 1944.
Handbooks such as this example were assembled, as required, from different stocks of printed sheets. The stiff card covers are generic and the sheets are string tied within the case. This facilitated ready insertion of updated sheets, and removal of old information (being relevant in active combat as obsolete information could be misleading and therefore hazardous). As such, there is no standardised issue or conventional collation for battlefield recognition literature, and each instance need be reckoned individually.
This aircraft recognition manual contains approximately 100 sheets subdivided into the following sections: U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, United Kingdom, Third Reich, Japan, and Italy. The section demarcating aircraft of the U.S.S.R. has not been filled, which may well provide some indication of where the original owner was stationed. Each of the aircraft is described, most are photo illustrated and all have schematic silhouette diagrams of the underneath, front and side-on views. Item #3366
Price (AUD): $250.00