The Mighty Eighth: Coming Home

Description

A rare secondary market print, The Mighty Eighth – Coming Home by Robert Taylor features B-17s and B-24s returning from a mission with a P-51 Mustang fighter escort.
One of a pair (the other being Mighty Eighth – Outward Bound) within Robert Taylor’s Golden Anniversary Series, commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the American Air Forces in Europe.
From their first inauspicious raid on German airfields on 4th July, 1942, to their ultimate air supremacy over the skies of Europe in 1945, the men of the U.S Air Forces never wavered in their determination nor flinched from the frightening odds they faced. The vindication of their policy of high altitude daylight precision bombing came with the ultimate victory of the Allied forces in 1945.
In three years of continual combat, the bomber crews of the USAAF overcame the worst odds. They often flew in atrocious weather, they ran the gauntlet of the Luftwaffe fighter Aces, and they pressed on through all the flak that anti-aircraft gunners could throw up at them. They paid the heavy price of war, but in so doing carved out a niche in history, and created a legend that will live so long as man takes to the skies.
To commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the arrival in Europe of the men and machines of the Mighty Eighth, Robert Taylor painted two remarkable works of art. Each, in a very special way evoking the heroic deeds of the immortal men who flew the awesome combat missions of World War 2, and each providing a perpetual tribute to the debt owed to these intrepid aviators. In this the second in Robert Taylor’s set, the valiant bombers of the Eighth Air Force are coming home. Set in a majestic panorama of evening sunlight, a battle-weary bomber force approaches the coast of Belgium. A B-17 Fortress sheds debris as it struggles to stay with the group, while three B-24 liberators have joined the formation for the North Sea crossing. A lone P-51, low on fuel, flies close escort.
Robert Taylor’s Limited Edition, Mighty Eighth – Coming Home, is signed by 6 distinguished pilots who flew with the Mighty Eighth:
Major General Bob Landry
Colonel William Lawley
Colonel Edward Michael
Colonel Robert Morgan
Major Cliff Peterson
Colonel Albert Shower.