Fairey Swordfish, part one, foreign users

The Fairey Swordfish is a British biplane torpedo bomber designed by the Fairey Aviation Company. It was nicknamed "The Stringbag" and was operated mainly by the Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm and the Royal Air Force, but also by other operators. The first countries to be covered in this post are:

• Netherlands: Right since its inception in June 1943 at RNAS Donibristle, in Scotland, the No.860 (Dutch) Naval Air Squadron was equipped with Swordfishes. They performed torpedo-bomber reconnaissance duties until November when they were rebased to Maydown, in Northern Ireland, to be splitted in two flights of six aircraft each, to operate from merchant aircraft carriers MV Acavus and MV Gadila and later just from MV Macoma and Acavus from June 1944. They performed that role with the Swordfishes until June 1945 when the old-fashioned biplanes were replaced by the more advanced Fairey Barracudas.
• Italy: At least four Swordfishes were captured by the Italian Regia Aeronautica.
  One was captured just after the bombardment of Taranto, albeit in poor condition and was savaged.
  Another one, belonging to the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle was shot down and captured during a raid on Maritza Airfield, in Rhodes, on 4th September 1940. It was sent to Italian mainland, repainted in Italian markings and sent to Guidonia (Italian's Regia Aeronautica test centre). It was kept in flying conditions until mid-1941 thanks to spare parts taken from another captured aircraft.
  The fourth one, took off from HMS Ark Royal (91) to bomb the city of Cagliari, in Sardinia, but was hit by ground anti-air fire. It force-landed on the Italian airfield at Elmas, in Sardinia too, on 2nd August 1940. The crew were taken prisoner and the aircraft was repaired by the Italian firm Caproni. It was refitted with an Alfa-Romeo 125 engine and was taken to Guidonia for testing on 27th February 1941. It seems that by 6th April 1942, it was still there, however it was most likely destroyed in one of the Allied air raids.
• Spain: At least two Swordfish ended in the hands of the Spanish Ejército del Aire (Spanish Air Force).
  The first one, belonging to the 813 Naval Air Squadron, was based in Gibraltar when, during an anti-submarine patrol, lost its sweep and force landed between Ras-el-Farea and Pota-Pescadores in Spanish Morocco on 30th April 1942. The crew were interned and the fate of the machine is unknown.
  The second one, a floatplane, belonged to a detachment of the 700 Naval Air Squadron, that was operating from the Battleship HMS Malaya (01) ran out of fuel while it was shadowing the German pocket Battleship Scharnhorst on 8th March 1941, close to the Canary Islands. Both aircraft and crew were interned by Spanish authorities and, as the aircraft was serviceable, it was put into use in the Spanish Air Force with a new registration and assigned to 54ª Escuadrilla (54th Flight) on 6th December 1943, which operated from Puerto de La Cruz, in the Island of Tenerife, Canary Islands. It was written-off in March 1945 at Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, also in the aforementioned archipelago.

Sources:

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairey_Swordfish#Operators

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/860_Naval_Air_Squadron

3. http://incidentessgm.blogspot.com/2013/11/fairey-swordfish.html (translated)