David Vincent; self-published South Australia, 1999; hard cover; 21.5 x 28cm; 424p, 213 illustrations, ISBN 9780959605228
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The Lockheed Hudson acheived fame as Australia’s main modern warplane in the early part of the Pacific War, bearing the brunt of the fight against the Japanese. Respected aviation author David Vincent became interested in the history of RAAF Hudsons in the early 1970s when he helped with the retrieval of a Hudson fuselage from the Adelaide hills. He decided to write a book on the subject in the 1980s, but such was the enormity of the subject one book soon became two. Book One details the RAAF Hudson experience in Malaya, Australia (not including the Northern Territory) and the Middle East. The much anticipated Book Two covers RAAF Hudson operations from the Northern Territory, Ambon, Timor, New Britain and New Guinea. Both books cover non-operational aspects of the RAAF's Hudson usage, and just as the first chapter in Book One explains why there were Hudsons in Australia to begin with, the last chapter in Book Two tells readers what happened to the survivors post-World War II. The result of more than 20 years research, the two volumes are an amazingly detailed resource, containing hundreds of interesting stories, anecdotes (all fully footnoted) and photos.
When writing the books Vincent directly consulted with many dozens of Hudson veterans that are listed at the beginning of each volume. As a result there is a great deal of information, often sourced from logbooks, not contained in the official squadron records which for some wartime periods are non-existent.
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