USAAF 434th Fighter Squadron, 479th Fighter Group, 8th AF Squadron Patch and Photo/Letter

This is a great album containing photos of and letters written home by United States Army Air Forces Lt. Robert K. Redwood, a P-51 Mustang pilot of the 434th Fighter Squadron, 479th Fighter Group, 8th Air Force. Redwood flew 19 combat missions escorting bombers over Germany (see record of sorties in photos above). The album contains hundreds of letters but not a lot of content. There are some great photos of Redwood and his aircraft, including one shot where he is prominently wearing the companion patch. The patch is richly colored in red and blue, shows a horse head on a Jack playing card and reads TUTOR ET ULTOR (protector and defender).

Circa World War II.

Patch: approximately 5-1/4" in height and 4-1/4" in width; album: approximately 11-1/2" in height and 15-1/2" in width and 2" thick (37 pages).

Patch: felt embroidered in cotton/silk threads with burlap backing; album: vinylized cloth (leatherette), construction paper pages, photographs, paper (letters and miscellany), fully embroidered patch in cotton/silk threads (USAAF patch glued to inside front of album), cotton lace.

Album: holes with cotton lace.

This is from a United States Army Air Forces collection which we will be listing more of over the next few months. MDJX09 LABJJX3/11 SAAHE4/11

7 (Very Fine): The patch has about a half dozen small areas of mothing; album has light to medium wear mostly to page edges (some letters and photos have become unglued and are loose in album) and some light abrasions on its reverse.

As with all my artifacts, this piece is guaranteed to be original, as described.