This was from a thread on the "Nurflugel" flying wings list about Me 109 landing accidents.

...Also the Spitfire, and the few other aircraft where the gear was mounted inboard. But they had the advantage of lower wing loading and slower landing speed, thus less tricky on the ground...

From : Don Stackhouse

Actually, according to my references, as well as experience with R/C models, the Spitfire is one of the best behaved of the WW II taildragger warbirds on the ground.

Yes, it has a narrow gear, which contributes to somewhat low lateral stability on the ground. However, it has a very long tail moment, which provides very high dynamic stability about both the pitch and yaw axes. This tends to snuff out ground loops and bounces before they have a chance to get started.

Static stability and control authority are linearly proportional to both tail area and tail moment arm. However, although dynamic stability is linear with tail area, it's proportional to the SQUARE of the tail moment arm. Note, this is why getting decent dynamic stability is such a challenge for many flying wings, with their inherently short effective tail moment arms.

This characteristic of a long tail moment with a relatively small tail surface area has been very successful for a number of airplanes. The Ryan Navion, whose rock-steady handling in turbulence is legendary (my father considered it the best instrument trainer ever built), had a small tail on a long tail moment. Its tail volume coefficient was right in the middle of the normal range for an airplane in its class, nothing to indicate anything special. However, when you consider the effects of that tail moment arm on dynamic stability, the numbers for the Navion come out about two and a half times greater in its favor in comparison to the others in its class. Conversely, the Bonanza, a notorious tail-wagger in turbulence, doesn't come out so well in the tail-moment-arm analysis.

Likewise, the Spitfire has a small tail on a long moment arm, perhaps even more extreme in that regard than the Navion. The late Jeff Ethell, who knew his warbirds about as well as just about anyone I can think of, wrote:

"The most surprising thing about the Spitfire is how easy it is to take off and land. With an extremely narrow undercarriage, similar in many ways to the Me109, and a non-locking full-swiveling tailwheel it should have a built-in ground loop, but it is viceless. The swing to the right is easily countered by the rudder and pneumatic brakes... Full stall three-point landings are wonderful as the Spit settles onto the ground with a minimum of input on the rudders..."

Our own little Roadkill Series Mk I Spitfire profile electric backyard/indoor R/C model is also very well behaved on the ground. Yes, the narrow gear makes it easy to lift up onto one wheel, but that action does not have any tendency to develop from there into a ground loop.

The Zero also has plenty of tail moment, and is likewise delightful on the ground.

One of the best-behaved taildragger models on the ground that I've flown is the old "Prairie Bird". It's a 42" scaled-up free-flight conversion, with narrow gear set WAAYYY forward of the C/G. This location makes it essentially immune to nose-overs, but would also normally make it a bouncing and ground-looping fool on touchdown. However, it has the large tail on an enormous tail moment arm that it inherited from its free-flight ancestor. Any thought of a bounce or ground loop on touchdown gets mercilessly smothered by those aft appendages, before it even has a chance to raise it.

In flight, the same concept holds true. Our sailplane designs have all tended to use long tail moment arms, particularly our beginners' airplanes the Chrysalis series. These in particular have such strong dynamic stability that I've been able to ballast them with the C/G so far behind the aft limit that the plane becomes slightly statically divergent in pitch, then hand the transmitter to a first-time beginner. Despite being statically unstable, the extremely well damped dynamic response allows the beginner to stay ahead of the airplane.

In my experience, the dynamic stability has a stronger influence on handling qualities, both in flight and on the ground, than almost any other factor. And tail moment arm is probably one of its most important parameters. Don Stackhouse
DJ Aerotech