20004 Sqd Ldr. George Silvester Royal Air Force 32 Squadron On October 9, 1944, MJ730 was transferred again to 32 Sqn., RAF at Kalamaki, Greece The aircraft was chosen by Sqn. Ldr. George Silvester, DFC, as his personal plane. Before its individual code had been assigned, he jokingly said to some of his ground crew that there was "a bit of a question mark" over which identity letter to give his personal Spitfire, because as Squadron Leader, he belonged to neither A Flight or B Flight. The ground crew as a lark placed a large "question mark" where the individual code letter would have normally appeared. Sqn. Ldr. Silvester was amused by the gesture and MJ730 was referred to as "The COs Query". "I would find out from the engineering officer what letter was allocated to the aircraft. I liked to paint (I had a steadier hand in those days) and normally did this myself. I remember having a template made with small holes in suitable places." When the CO came back from satisfactorily test flying this aircraft, Cpl Tylee asked what code letter should put be put on the Spitfire? "... he jokingly said that there was a bit of a question mark over which identity letter to giver his Spitfire.... because he was neither A Flight nor B Flight". According to the former airframe fitter, the groundcrew took the initiative and Cpl Tyler painted a large question mark (temporarily, using whitewash, he later told me) where a code letter would normally be positioned. The CO (Sqn Ldr G. Silvester DFC) was amused by this and said it could stay. Cpl Tylee therefore painted a permanent mark on the aircraft and it was thenceforth known by squadron personnel as The COs Query. [NOTE I used this as the title of my book on the aircrafts history.] Furthermore, Betty Silvester, Sqn Ldr Silvesters widow, sent me documents and photographs in which her husband referred to MJ730, in its GZ-? coding, as His kite. Although I am aware of at least one other WW2 squadron using a ? coding on a Spitfire.
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