one of the most dramatic dog fights of World War II Bud Anderson and his P-51 Old Crow against a skilled German Ace in a 109 now recreated in stunning realism with real gun camera footage let’s relive the greatest dog fight of America’s last living Triple A as well as his final missions in World War II it is now may of 1944 Captain Bud Anderson has just become an ace scoring his fifth confirmed kill after shooting down a mmid 109 just a few days prior but there is little time to celebrate such milestones in The 357th Fighter Group

and across the Allied Forces in England the most crucial moment of the war is approaching Operation Overlord the invasion of Normandy France this approaching operation would require major support from from the fly boys of the Eighth Air Force fly boys like Captain Anderson their job above all else was to safely escort the American bombers as they attempted to pound German strongholds and protect the way for the troops on the ground this was no easy task however as the lwaa knew this all too well and adjusted their strategy

accordingly making sure to attack in an organized manner that would inflict the most damage possible on the bomber formation it seemed we were always outnumbered we had more Fighters than they did but What mattered was how many they could put up in one area they would concentrate in huge numbers by the hundreds at times they would assemble way up ahead pick a section of the bomber formation and then come in head on their guns blazing sometimes biting the bombers below us before we knew what was happening but by now the Germans were

beginning to feel the attrition of War especially in their Air Force Bud Anderson stated this well in his book to fly and fight even in may we were seeing a very mixed bag of loffa Pilots when we saw them at all by the fall of 1944 the Germans were sending kids into combat with only 60 hours of flying time and as little as 20 in Fighters by comparison by the time I saw a combat I’d had almost 900 hours and we had the oil the planes the pilots and time on our side against men so well trained these new German Pilots were Cannon

F we didn’t know at the time how green some of them were of course we treated each of them with respect as if he were the Red Baron there were plenty of those as well Germany’s surviving old hands were Splendid pilots flying aircraft that were still more than adequate to push a Mustang right up to its limits Anderson was exactly right there were many pilots who were green but also many who were seasoned still leading the attacks against the American bombers and often times you never had any idea which one you were up against until the dog

fight was over so when a pilot was in combat each German adversary had to be treated as if he were the best pilot you had fa thus far but if nothing else Bud like many of the other American Pilots had a great deal of confidence in their new aircraft the P-51 Mustang these differences in aircraft would play a crucial role in determining the Victor in Bud’s next dog fight one that he would refer to as the most intense Battle of his career this would take place on May 27th of 1944 on this Mission as the 357th had

just linked up with their assigned bombers the radio began to come to life and it sounded like this was no small attack Bandits 11 blue Le break left Bandit on your tail red one the action was ahead and was quickly going to be right on top of them now normally the German Fighters would tried to avoid the Mustangs and other escorts they did not particularly care for tangling with the fighters as their primary target was the bombers but today things would be different for one of the only times in Anderson’s career the

mesure schmits came after him as Old Crow LED their flight into a turn to begin to engage engage the bandits one of Bud’s men quickly called out bogey 5:00 High sure enough they were four specs behind as they neared it became clear that these were indeed hostile four measure Smits that were beginning an attack run on their flight immediately Old Crow and the Mustangs break and a turning fight ensues four p51s and four meas SMS turning to see who will live and who will die and all Al though in this dog fight the 109’s originally had the

height Advantage the Mustang was able to turn just a little quicker inside of the German fighter and quickly the German Pilots sense this they pull off of the turn and straighten out opting to try and escape the dog fight with their engines at full speed but Anderson and his flight continue after them suddenly as they are approaching the Germans one of the 109’s pulls off leaving the other three likely setting up an attack Anderson sends his element leader Eddie Simpson and his wingmen after them while Old Crow and his wingmen continue after

the other three in a few moments Captain Bud Anderson has a shot right at the trailing 109 from 6:00 he fires the rounds find the Bandit and smoke pours out the 109 interestingly rolls onto its back however flying upside down for a few moments before Anderson fires again this time Landing hits and sending the German down his sixth kill of the war here we can see some of the gun camera footage from this Chase with Anderson firing on the 109 from directly behind in the next few seconds his Focus immediately shifts to the other two

Germans still ahead they are now aware that he is there and Bud even remembers their aircraft slightly twitching clearly indicating that the two German Pilots are looking over their shoulders to try and see the situation behind them after watching their trailing plane go down the two remaining 109s immediately split with the second one diving and trying to escape but the leader quite the opposite he opts to climb to the left giving no indication that he wants to run it is clear already that this is no green pilot and he is

not afraid of a dog fight this one could be trouble Bud once again describes this combat beautifully in his book we turn inside and my wingman and I still at long range and he pulls around harder passing in front of us right to left at an impossible angle I want to swing in behind him but I’m going too fast and figure I would only go skiding on past a must buting at speed simply can’t make a square corner and in a dog fight you don’t want to surrender your air speed I decided to overshoot him and climb he reverses his turn trying to

fall in behind us my wingman is vulnerable now I tell Scarrow to break off and he peels away the German goes after him and I go after the German closing on his tail before he can close on my wingman he sees me coming and Dives away with me after him then makes a climbing left turn I go screaming by pull up and he’s reversing his turn man he can fly and he comes crawling right up behind me close enough that I can see him distinctly he’s bringing his nose up for a shot and I haul back on the stick and climb even harder I keep going

up up and still up because I’m out of Alternatives bud is now alone with a very skilled 109 Close behind on his tail he has nowhere to go but up and his fate will clearly be determined by which aircraft gives way first I’m a fallen down dead man but not quite I look back I can see that he is shuddering on the verge of a stall he hasn’t been able to get his nose up enough hasn’t been able to bring that big gun to Bear almost but not quite his nose begins dropping just as my airplane too begins shuttering he stalls a second or two

before I stall he drops drops away just before I do good old Mustang suddenly the mmid begins to shutter ever so slightly and then she stalls 2 seconds later Old Crow also stalls and gives way the trusty American P-51 had saved Anderson’s life but the dog fight wasn’t over yet he is falling away now and I flopped the nose over and go after him hard we are very high by this time 6 miles and then some and falling very very fast the messes had a head start plummeting out of my range but I’m closing up quickly Benny flattens out and comes around hard

to the left and starts climbing again as if he wants to come at me head on suddenly we’re right back where we started this German pilot clearly knows what he is doing to beat this one bud is going to have to take some risks that much is clear so the M Schmidt is coming around again climbing hard to his left and I’ve had about enough of this my angle is a little bit better this time so I roll the dice instead of cobbing it like before and sailing on by him I decide to turn hard left inside him knowing that if I lose speed and don’t

make it it I probably won’t get home I pull back on the throttle slightly put down 10° of flaps and haul back on the stick just as hard as I can and the nose begins coming up and around slowly slowly hot damn I’m going to make it I’m inside him pulling my sights up to him and the German pilot can see this this time it’s the messes Schmid that breaks away and goes zooming straight up engine at maximum power without much alternative I come in with full power and follow him up and the Gap Narrows swiftly he is hanging by his prop not

quite vertically and I am right there behind him and it is terribly clear having tested the theory less than a minute ago that he is going to stall and fall away before or I do I have him he must know that I have him Old Crow indeed has him right where he wants him in a couple of seconds the 109 stalls and Bud pulls the trigger the tracers fly and the rounds rake the 109 across sending smoke flying in the actual gun camera footage from this Chase we can see the 109 going upwards coming to a stall and and the 50

caliber rounds drilling the aircraft in what seems like slow motion the 109 stalls and falls out of the sky with Anderson’s P-51 right beside it the Bandit goes straight down for 20,000 ft before eventually exploding on the earth Anderson’s seventh confirmed kill this German pilot would likely be the greatest adversary that he ever saw a skilled German who met his end at the machine gun of Old Crow in many ways it was not even Anderson that won the fight but the P-51 it very easily could have been the other way around if one small thing had

gone differently but that’s how it went and as evening came on the 27th of May Bud was simply happy to be alive he had taken on a very skilled adversary and had made it out you simply never knew what you were going to get in the summer of 19 1944 his very next mission would be clear evidence of that this would take place on May 30th during this Mission bud and his flight were escorting over Germany and here they spotted a large flight of 109’s preparing to pounce on the bombers immediately they dove in and very soon

it became clear that Bud’s Target was no Ace and likely he did not have very much experience at all as Anderson led the attack into the group of mids he opened fire on the trailing aircraft and almost immediately the pilot turned and Dove away he was either told by his leader to lead the Mustangs away or possibly he panicked either way it was clear from his actions that this pilot wasn’t the best the Germans had to offer flying in the trailing position and leaving his formation the green German continued and

Dove towards the ground trying to escape but 25,000 ft later he ran out of sky and had nowhere to go here Anderson pulled up behind and prepared to fire when suddenly the German took care of his own demise likely scared to death and trying to look over his shoulder the green pilot pushed the stick forward probably by mistake while trying to look backwards this caused the aircraft to go slightly nosed down where he impacted the ground at full speed and exploded instantly here we can see the gun camera footage again from this Victory because

bud did not actually fire a shot before the German went down we do not have the explosion on camera however Bud does pull the trigger briefly here making sure that his camera records the 109 clearly on fire on the ground now interestingly Bud also members some very specific details about this Victory this I remember in slow motion stop action there was a farmer driving a horse and Wagon on the road just ahead moving right to left and the fighter crashed right behind him just short of the road the fireball with its great

burning chunks of wreckage burst across the road where the wagon had been seconds earlier the horse spooked geared up pawed at the air I can close my eyes even now and see the poor Farmer’s face now I have tried very hard to enhance this footage and locate the horse or wagon but the explosion is fairly far ahead and the footage in 1944 was not quite high resolution perhaps you can locate it but regardless I’m sure he’s down there somewhere Frozen in time and scared for his life as he eventually returned to base Bud

Anderson had now scored his eighth confirmed kill the legend of Old Crow continued to grow but his next kill would have to wait for the next month things changed something big was clearly coming and that something would be D-Day on June 5th the unit was grounded and all aircraft were painted with the famous black and white Invasion Stripes to keep friendly fire at a minimum in addition to this new paint job a new strategy came about as well instead of long range escort missions most of the action was low-level Patrol

and support with dive bombing included here as well we can see some of Bud’s gun camera footage from June of 1944 in the days following D-Day where Old Crow and the yoxford boys pounded ground targets and strafed anything German that they could find to try and pave the way for the boys on the ground this was an important job and aided the Allied Forces greatly but like any fighter pilot he thirsted for another dog fight the next major escort mission for Bud would come on June 29 and this would be one of the most significant in his

Tour of Duty during this Mission the p-51s were nearing the Target and above the bombers when a gaggle of fak oful 190s passed to directly below them unfortunately for the Germans they had never seen old crow in the other Mustangs quickly Anderson pushed the stick down and began to approach the bandits lining up the leader and opening up with his Browning 50 calibers with a perfect shot he hit this faka wolf and the pilot quickly bailed out this scattered the rest of the Germans and Bud picked one more and went in after

him this 190 dove into some clouds and Bud followed the 190 likely thought that he was safe here and invisible to his adversary but he was mistaken the other dove into a thin Cloud to escape and uh it was they were so so thin that uh I merely follow this guy for a while I I could see him going through the clouds and slid Underneath Him and fired uh short few burst then it such an easy shot it was close by the time the 190 and P-51 exited the cloud Old Crow was right where she needed to be at Point Blank Range and directly behind

Bud again pulled the trigger and opened fire bullets struck the enemy aircraft and it went down in flames he pulled the canopy went off and so I knew he was given up and going to bail out so I I pulled up where I could just see him I could watch watch him uh yeah he had been injured cuz he was moving I was watching him bail out but as soon as the the canopy left the flame came fo in the C bit and then po it started to burn in around the cockpit area and he he actually settled back down into the cockpit and that finished him for

sure with two kills already and some ammunition still remaining the fight wasn’t over on his way back to the formation Bud spotted one more exposed German for the third time in this Mission he fired upon a ful of 190 and for the third time she went down with this pilot not getting out a few hours later bud would arrive back in England with three more kills now to be added to his tally it was his best Mission so far and his tally would be raised to 11 a double ace Bud would tally one more kill on July 7th another 109 that left itself

exposed likely a green pilot this would bring his total tally to 12 and A4 on the war his close friend and wingman on many of his earlier missions Eddie Simpson scored a kill on this date as well Eddie was one of the guys that had been with Bud for a long time he and Jim Browning they were without a doubt bud Anderson’s closest friends so as one can imagine two missions later when when Bud officially became the first of The Originals in the 357th to finish his tour with 300 combat hours flown it was a somber moment in a couple of days and

after a long boat ride he was Stateside where he would get a much needed break and he was treated like a hero back home unfortunately this happiness would not last just a couple of weeks after Bud left England Eddie Simpson was on a mission over France when his flight was jumped by a group of German fighters in the ensuing action Simpson collided with a friendly Mustang he was however able to bail out and survived but 4 days later he would be gunned down by German soldiers it was a crippling blow to Bud immediately after learning

about this he had to board his ship back to England heading back to complete a second tour upon arriving back to to his base in England he was given a new model of the P-51 the D model this one had six machine guns instead of four and the new bubble canopy appropriately Bud quickly had this one painted again with the famous words Old Crow his first major action of this second tour would take place on November 27th now while the Germans were on their heels at this point they were very far from defeated the L baa was still coming

up in force and in many ways was now more motivated than ever as most of the bombing raids were now in the midst of their Homeland on this day however the eth Air Force decided to try a new and bold strategy on this Mission there were no bombers instead simply a massive force of Mustangs that were sent to try and lure the Germans up hoping to easily eliminate them in a massive dog fight to do this they had one group of Mustangs fly like the normal escorts and the rest fly in a bomber style formation a combat

box to try and fool the Germans into thinking that this was a normal raid the plan worked almost too well the Germans responded with an absolutely massive amount of Fighters pushing more than 100 one can only imagine their surprise when they realized that they were coming in on Mustangs not bomb and that they would have to fight their way out of this one the bandits dove in and today they were Foles and more than could be counted Old Crow and the Mustangs engaged quickly bud got onto the tail of one of the Germans and opened up the 190

eventually stopped moving and slowly turned away the pilot almost certainly dead at the controls with no time to watch bud turned and looked for another he found it and pulled the trigger again to drill a second lone German which turned away smoking still however there was a dog fight underway and no time to confirm the kills so Bud pushed the stick and began to keep looking for more targets a few moments later now at a lower altitude they found them this time however they were two 190s and Bud quickly realized that they were on Final

Approach to land bud and his wingman dove in after them but the intelligent German Pilots realized that they had no chance so instead they opted to bring their planes in for a quick belly landing giving themselves a chance to fight another day rather than being shot down and killed by the Mustangs shortly thereafter Old Crow and the rest of the flight would turn for home the claims after this Mission were complicated with plenty of action to go around in the end Captain Anderson would claim three destroyed but would receive

credit for two and one probable raising his total to 14 one short of a triple Ace a week later on December 5th of 1944 one last major aerial battle took place in this Mission bud and his flight actually had to leave the main formation as one of the pilots in their group got sick at high altitude incidentally this brought them down right to where the Germans would be in this scrap Bud would have one final big day destroying two more 190s in a tangle over Berlin itself now at 16 kills captain Bud Anderson was a triple Ace Plus

One for the next few weeks both sides would fly very little as the winter brought about bad weather Captain Bud Anderson was promoted to Major and he flew a handful full of additional missions but he would not find himself in another major scrap in his overall combat tours over Europe Bud Anderson flew 116 missions scored 16 and a qu kill and never had to abort a single Mission he was also never hit by enemy aircraft when Bud left Europe however his good friend and one of the other Originals Jim Browning remained behind

to finish out his tour one month later in February Browning and a wingman got into a fight with two German Jets mmid Emy 262s during this dog fight Browning’s leader went after one and he the other after his leader shot his measure Schmid down he turned and looked for Jim who was nowhere to be found he vanished and would be listed as missing in action following the war Bud had a son and a daughter he named his son James Edward Anderson after Eddie and Jim his closest friends in the 357th who were both killed in action over

Europe many years later bud son Jim would travel to Europe and help located the wreckage of Jim Browning’s Mustang confirming the theory that he likely collided with the 262 in the Years following World War II Anderson became a test pilot and served in many different roles for the United States Air Force he retired in 1972 in 2022 Bud Anderson turned 100 years old and was promoted to Brigadier General by the United States Air Force through him his family and his book to fly and fight the story of Old Crow lives on.