No 3 Photographic Reconnaissance Unit was formed at Royal Air Force Oakington on the 16th of November 1940 with the specific mission of gathering bomb damage assessment photography for Bomber Command. The rationale behind this decision being that No 1 PRU had failing to obtain sufficient imagery to confirm the positive results of RAF bombing raids.

Spitfire reconnaissance aircraft and pilots were in short supply at this point in the war and it took the units Commanding Officer, Squadron Leader Patrick Ogilvie, some months to obtain his aircraft. Cameras were even more of a problem, especially those with long focal lengths which would be suitable for detailed high altitude reconnaissance. In the event, No 3 PRU salvaged German Zeiss cameras from crashed enemy reconnaissance aircraft and installed them in their Spitfires.

On the 29th of November Squadron Leader Ogilvie was able to mount the unit's first operational sortie and by January 1941 he had some 5 Spitfires and 2 night reconnaissance Wellingtons at his disposal.

Ironically, far from proving that the Bomber Command crews were being successful, No 3 PRU soon established that bombing accuracies were significantly worse than even No 1 PRU had been suggesting. Indeed, pioneering night photography proved that only 14% of Bomber Command's aircraft were over the target at the time they released their bombs.

Cameras were added to bomber aircraft themselves, but these just proved the same unpalitable truth, Bomber Command was missing. For example on the 24th of December 1940 some 1000 bombs had been dropped on Gelsenkirchen, but only a handful of craters were evident on the post-attack photography of the target.

Night bombing image with searchlight patterns

Bomber crews sought to avoid flying camera equipped aircraft and photographic interpreters and their results were sometimes impounded, if not imprisoned, by embarrassed station commanders. One of these interpreters was Pilot Officer Bernard Babington-Smith, the brother of Constance Babington-Smith who was later to achieve fame for her photographic interpretation work on the German rocket and jet fighters at the Baltic coast experimental establishment of Pennemunde. Bernard went on to fully develop the science of interpreting night bombing imagery and set the Allied standard for all that followed.

Eventually, the evidence of Bomber Command's true results did filter through to the highest levels and complacency rapidly turned to action in the form of scientific and technical solutions to improve bombing accuracy such as new bombsights, navigation aids and ground mapping radar. Indeed, of the situation No 3 PRU uncovered, Winston Churchill was so disposed to write : “ The air photographs showed how little damage was being done. It also appeared that the crews knew this, and were discouraged by the poor results of so much hazard. Unless we could improve on this there did not seem much use in continuing night bombing”.

X4712 Burns After Crashing

On the 14th March 1941, Sqn Ldr Ogilive conducted a post-attack reconnaissance of Berlin following a raid by No.40 Squadron. He flew there in Spitfire X4712 and become the first RAF pilot to overfly the German Capital in daylight. He landed back at Alconbury just before 5 o'clock in the afternoon with only 20 gallons of fuel remaining in his tanks. For this daring exploit and the 95 images he collected he received the Distinguished Service Order (DSO). Shortly afterwards X4712 was unfortunately lost when it was engaged by an ME109 fighter north of Den Helder in the Netherlands. The Berlin sortie is depicted on the Little Stukeley village sign.

By July when the unit was regularised into the RAF's mainstream reconnaissance force at Benson, No 3 PRU had flown 285 Spitfire and 13 Wellington operational reconnaissance sorties. In eight months, the unit had proven the worth of night reconnaissance and established many of the principles of bomb damage reconnaissance and interpretation. As a result a specialist night reconnaissance unit was formed, No 544 Squadron and a Wellington subsequently flew the opening night reconnaissance sortie of DDay. No 3 PRU was subsequently re-formed in the Far East; however, on the 11th of December 1944 Group Captain Ogilvie went missing over the North Sea.