Faith, Hope & Charity

In April 1940 Malta was having its first taste of aerial bombing from neighbouring Sicily which is only 50 or 60 miles away by Axis bombers and fighters. Aerial defence of the island was simply non existent, so something very drastic had to be done. HMS Glorious, a Royal Navy Carrier, left 8 crated Gloster gladiators in Malta when it departed from the island. It was decided to keep 4 of them in Malta to try and cope with the onslaught and the other 4 were handed over to HMS Eagle.

They were quickly rigged and made operational to meet the enemy in the skies over the tiny island. They were the only hope for the island’s survival, so they were nicknamed Faith, Hope and Charity. The other aircraft was cannibalized for the parts urgently needed to keep the other 3 flying.

The Model

The model is in 1/72 scale and it’s about a metre square. I used the Heller gladiator kits which were detailed accordingly. Modified Airfix vehicles were used and I tried to be as faithful as possible to actual photographs. An assortment of polyurethane figures were used, and this involved some conversion works on the tiny figures to achieve the required results. The rest, equipment, buildings, trees and so on were all scratch-built. The diorama represents the Maltese countryside, as at first these planes were kept in a field with minimal basic commodities to fly them. One can see the typical Maltese rubble walls which were fashioned out of little pebbles glued to a backing cardboard strip, the prickly pears cactus trees which were built leaf by leaf using epoxy putty. I tried to show the things that makes the Maltese countryside which also include the little chapel and farmhouse and the little veggie cart. The buildings were made out of balsa wood covered with a clay compound and later scribed. The chapel still stands to this very day. The place was called Hal Far which was a little barren piece of countryside . It also accommodated a small airfield which was later used by two squadrons of Spitfires.