Spitfire VIII, A58-484 (British serial JG543) at Morotai in March 1945; one of three Spitfire MkVIII's allocated to Clive R Caldwell.

This aircraft like many others, was delivered to the RAAF wearing the RAF 'desert' scheme of Dark Earth, Middle Stone and Azure Blue. The Middle Stone portions were subsequently over painted in Foliage Green. Pilot initials 'CR-C' were Sky Blue, spinner and fuselage band in white with black bands. Below the cockpit was a Group Captain rank pennant and an impressive scoreboard indicating aerial victories against German, Italian and Japanese aircraft. Of note is the relative contrast between upper surface camouflage colours. RAF 'desert' camouflaged Spitfires typically had a 'darker' shade of the standard RAF colour Dark Earth resulting in a relatively lower contrast upper scheme when combined with RAAF Foliage Green.

At wars end Caldwell was officially credited as the RAAF's highest scoring ace with a total of 28.5 enemy aircraft shot down, 20.5 of which were gained in RAF squadrons in the Middle East . Although his last aerial victory was a Mitsubishi 'Dinah' over Darwin in August 1943 the scoreboard on A58-484 shows a total of only 27.5. The variance was due to the scoreboard being calculated by his ground crew with reference to his logbook comments rather than any official documentation.

The serial number is unusual in that the letter styles of 'A58' and '-484' are different and not in alignment. It appears that the '-484' portion of the serial was over-painted when the fuselage band was applied and later reapplied using a different letter style stencil. The rudder carries the No. 80 (Fighter) Wing 'ace of spades' emblem. White wing leading edge had a 'straight' edge on underside and a narrower tapering edge on the upper wing surface. The underside of the cannon fairings were also painted white. All roundels were 32 inches in diameter.

Upper surface camouflage pattern depicted below is partly speculative and assumes the partial repainting with RAAF colours would follow approximately the original RAF standard pattern.

The Australian War Memorial has within its archives a brief BW film clip of this aircraft taken by the RAAF public relations unit at Morotai in early 1945.