The Blackburn Boudicca

Spinners · April 2, 2016

Blackburn Boudicca Mk.IIC - No.26 Squadron, Royal Air Force, 1941

As soon as Hitler and his Nazi party had taken control of Germany in 1933 and turned it into a dictatorship with a hostile diplomatic strategy the UK Government began to realise that Germany was most likely to be a future enemy and a secret report by the Defence Requirements Committee recommended the rebuilding of the UK's armed forces. By 1934 an ambitious expansion programme began to be discussed by the UK Government leading to a review of the condition of the armed forces by the Committee of Imperial Defence who recommended an enlargement and modernisation of all three armed services. For the Royal Air Force, 'Expansion Scheme A' was approved by the Cabinet providing for the growth of the Royal Air Force to a strength of 111 front-line squadrons at home and overseas together with 16 Fleet Air Arm squadrons and all to be achieved by March 1939.

Whilst much of the expansion was to consist of defensive aircraft for the newly created Fighter Command there was an almost equal expansion for Bomber Command and Coastal Command including, for the latter, the clandestine creation of a dedicated 'anti-invasion' force of attack aircraft designed to repel invading forces. The Committee of Imperial Defence recommended that the creation of this anti-invasion force should be kept secret to avoid creating the impression that war and invasion was inevitable and to help avoid any defeatist attitude or panic amongst the general public. The design of a suitable attack aircraft was entrusted to Blackburn Aircraft Limited who designed a strong and robust single-engined, low-wing monoplane with a crew of two especially designed for ground attack missions. Powered by a Rolls-Royce Merlin II rated at 1,030 hp the Boudicca was smaller all round than the contemporary Fairey Battle but substantially heavier due to the inclusion of armour plate and an armoured keel throughout the forward and centre fuselage.

Given the company designation of B-23 the design was given the official name of Boudicca but was not officially revealed to the public until November 1939 having previously been hidden under a flimsy cover story that Blackburn were producing a Merlin-engined Roc. Entering service in May 1940 only two squadrons were operational at the time of the Battle of Britain but this was only due to the emergency transferral of many Coastal Command pilots to Fighter Command and Blackburn had been stockpiling airframes since April 1940 as Merlin output was diverted to fighter production. From October 1940 the RAF had began to think of a new role for their new attack aircraft but with the threat of invasion diminishing Churchill demanded that the type was thrown into action in North Africa and all Coastal Command aircraft were transferred to Middle East Command in November 1940. However, with the pilot situation improving, the RAF were allowed to create two new home-based squadrons with No.26 and No.87 squadrons being re-equipped with the improved Boudicca Mk.II which they operated in the night intruder role with moderate success during 1941 and 1942.