During World War Two an American naval officer stared at a Swordfish for
the first time.
'Where did that come from?' he asked. 'Fairey's', came the reply from a
British naval officer standing nearby. He stroked his chin thoughtfully.
'That figures', he replied.
This is a narrative account of the operations of the Fairey Swordfish
throughout World War Two. The most famous of these was the attack on the
Italian fleet at Taranto, crippling three battleships and damaging
several other ships as well as the seaplane base and an oil storage
depot. The Swordfish played a prominent part in the Battle of Matapan
and in the sinking of the Bismark. Less happily, Swordfish were used in
the unsuccessful and ill-prepared raid on the Germans at Petsamo and in
the abortive attack on the battle cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau
during the Channel Dash in 1942.
Throughout the book, the text is interwoven with personal accounts by
naval airmen.