'Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise My footstool earth, my canopy the skies'
Alexander Pope (1688–1744)
A Corsair over a setting sun is an ominous sign. On the last wartime cruise of the USS Essex (CV-9), one of her VBF-83 F4U-1Ds was photographed sometime between March and June 1945 with another Essex-class flattop in the distance. During this period, which spanned the invasion of Okinawa, the 73 combined fighters of VBF-83 and its companion Essex squadron, VF-83 in F6F-5 Hellcats, accounted for a total of 182 Japanese aircraft shot down.
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