The Bristol Beaufort is a British twin-engined torpedo bomber designed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, and developed from experience gained designing and building the earlier Blenheim light bomber.
Colour photo of two Beaufort Mk.Is of 217 Squadron
Beaufort first prototype L4441, at a display of new and prototype aircraft, RAF Northolt May 1939. Charles E Brown photograph.
A new late-production Beaufort Mk.II at the Filton factory. ASV yagi aerials are under the nose and wings and the new DF loop is fitted. Muzzles of additional Vickers GO are visible in the front upper nose.
Propaganda poster urging Australians to "bar the gates with Beauforts" against Japanese invasion.
The Blackburn B.26 Botha was a four-seat reconnaissance and torpedo bomber. It was produced by the British aviation company Blackburn Aircraft at its factories at Brough and Dumbarton.
Bristol Beaufort
…the Duke of Beaufort, whose ancestral home was nearby in Gloucestershire. The competing torpedo bomber entry from Blackburn was also ordered as the Blackburn Botha; in an unprecedented step, both designs were ordered straight off the drawing board, an indication of how urgently the RAF needed a new torpedo bomber…
Botha of No. 1 (Coastal) Operational Training Unit, preparing for departure on a training flight at Silloth, Cumberland