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Puttalam Elephants

by Robert Taylor


A Fleet Air Arm crew based at Puttalam in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) employ their elephant "Fiffi' to drag a Corsair back onto the metal runway after it slid off a slippery surface and landed in the mud.
Commissioned by one of the Corsair pilots stationed at H.M.S. Rajaliya in 1942, Robert Taylor's superb
painting "Puttalam Elephants" is one of many originals by Robert, hanging in the wonderful art collection of
the Fleet Air Arm Museum at Yeovilton. Much admired by tens of thousands of visitors each year, this painting depicts the unusual tactics employed at Puttalam in order to keep the land based naval fighters flying.
Operating happily in conditions where towing tractors quickly became bogged down, the Puttalam elephants
provided an invaluable service, and became much loved by the pilots and ground crew.

23½" x 30½"

Available in the following editions

400 Limited edition   Signed by three Fleet Air Arm Corsair pilots. $320 
350 Fleet Air Arm folio Signed by eight Fleet Air Arm Corsair pilots. $375 
25 Fleet Air Arm folio A/P Signed by eight Fleet Air Arm Corsair pilots. $530 


 


Limited edition signatures
Lieutenant Eric Beechinor RN Sub Lieutenant Gordon Dunnell RNVR
Sub Lieutenant Tony Maylett


Fleet Air Arm folio signatures
Lieutenant Eric Beechinor RN Sub Lieutenant Gordon Dunnell RNVR
Sub Lieutenant Tony Maylett Capt. Eric 'Winkle' Brown CBE, DSC, FRAes, RN
Sub Lieutenant Victor Kairis RN Lieutenant Cyril Price RN
Lieutenant Peter Twiss OBE, DSC*, RN Lieutenant Commander Bruce Vibert RN


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