Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

In 1944 Erich Hartmann Claimed only 1 Mustang –rather than the previously reported 6-7. This single claim was submitted on 24 Jun 44 –anyone venture to indicate whom his victim might have been?

Thanks

Mustang victims
 

hi,

you probably know that 325. FG lost two ships:

318. FS "42" Joseph W. Harper MIA 42-103599
319. FS "75" Howard F. Welch MIA 42-103552

relevant MACR could show more details in terms of time and circumstances.

According to Tony Wood´s list there is at least one confirmed Mustang claim of SG 2 pilot and two claims confirmed to 9./JG 52 including Hartmann. SG 2 and JG 52 claims have aproximately 30 minutes difference.

Horrido

Jan

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

The victim of Erich Hartmann on 24 june'44 was Joseph W. Harper.
The witness of the fight was romanian baterry nr 60 Krupp wich reported that one of their projectiles exploded near right side of a Mustang. The Mustang began to dive with white smoke on tail. At aprox 1500m height, two german fighters set the Mustang on fire and crashed near Loloiasca village (Prahova county). The pilot bail out and was interned in hospital of Urlati village due to his burns at head.
From the list of Tony Woods there were 3 P-51 claimed by germans over Romania that day, but only one crashed on romanian soil (Harper's P-51) the other pilot from 325th FG, Howard Welch crashed near Pesaro,Adriatic shore (Italy).

24.06.44 Fw. Dieter Voigt Stab II./SG 2 P-51 Mustang £ 65 331: at 7.000 m.09.25 FilmC. 2032/IAnerk: Nr. 24
24.06.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann 9./JG 52 Mustang £ 65 136: at 3.000 m. 09.50 Film C. 2032/I Anerk: Nr. 454
24.06.44 Fhj.Fw. Hans-Joachim Birkner 9./JG 52 Mustang £ 65 133: at 6.000 m. 09.56 Film C. 2032/I Anerk: Nr. 455

In the MACR report was mentioned that Harper engaged in fight at 9.20 hour, with 6 Meserschmitt's.

Attached Harper's MACR files

Cheers
Dan.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Dan,

thanks for your help in clearing up an aviation mystery!

Does anyone know, if Hartmann's claim location of 65 136 matches up with the reported crash site ~10 miles E of Ploesti? Also a Time Zone Querry, does Hartmann's timing of after 9 a.m. (0950) mean the same post 9 a.m. time given by Loftus (after 0920)?

Thanks in Advance,

Rob Romero

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Can I ask a question tangential to this topic? Largely due to the books of Toliver and Constable, I have assumed Hartmann was credited with 7 American-flown P-51 Mustangs amongst his 352 victories. Has this data changed? Is Hartmann now only credited with 1 Mustang in his victory total?

Thanks,
Kenneth

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

337 of Hartmann's victories are listed in Tony Wood's listing of Jagdwaffe Victories; only 1 is for a Mustang.

Rob Romero

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

I don't know what 65 136 stand for, but the map coordinates (44.58, 26.17) of Loloiasca village (mentioned in romanian AA report) match with coordinates from Harper's MACR ( 44.50, 26.00)
The small village Loloiasca is part of comunne Tomsani located south-est of Urlati village (where Harper was hospitalized).
Attached the map of the area.

Dan.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Hi Rob

Glad to help in this issue, but the mistery is not complet cleared.

From Tony Wood's list we can take out only the Bf-109 pilots claims (as Loftus mentioned that Harper engaged 6 Bf-109)
What about Birkner victory ? Could be a shared victory with Hartmann ?.
In romanian AA report was mentioned that 2 german fighters were pursued the diving Mustang and set him on fire.
As I read, Hans -Joachim Birkner (credited with 117 victories) was some times Hartman wingman. See the link.
http://www.luftwaffe.cz/birkner.html

Dan.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Kenneth

I wouldn’t use the Toliver and Constable (T&C) Book as the Gospel in respect to Erich Hartmann’s claims. The T&C book that I have in my possesion was written in 1970 with a revision in 1985. A lot has happened since then, including the finding of some of the RLM claims files that have been copied onto the Net by Tony Woods.

By T&Cs own admission the first 150 claims listed were taken from Hartmann’s first logbook however the remaining 202 are sourced from III/JG52 records and personal letters. These claims mostly lack detail and 28 of those are in a date range only.

The Tony Wood’s list was translated from the RLM microfilms. Robs states he has 337 claims, I’ve actually got 324 but I believe 3 of these are either double up or incorrect, unfortunately I don’t have a copy of the original to confirm this.

Now, when comparing the Tony Wood’s list with the T&C list, you would expect that the first 150 claims to match as they were taken from the RLM listing and Hartman’s first logbook. This is not the case, they don’t! Of the 150 claims 7 differ on dates, 8 differ on time and 22 differ on type. This is without looking at location in detail. That means only 113 of the claims match. This would indicate some translation errors of handwritten documents and possible clerical error.

For the remaining 202, 171 claims are listed in the Wood’s list (RLM) with the remaining 31 claims not listed at all.

Of the 171 (Wood’s) listed claims when compared to the T&C list, we note that 14 are missing from T&Cs list (No 267 – 280 24/5/44-23/8/44), 44 differ in date and 17 differ on type. This leave 96 that generally agree but remember there is no time and few types and locations listed in the T&C List.

Of the remaining 31 not listed in Tony Wood’s list, I’ve compared these to Barbas’s “Die Geschicht der I Gruppe des Jagdgeschwader 52” and “Die Geschicht der II Gruppe des Jagdgeschwader 52”. Again 14 are missing from T&Cs list (No. 333 – 346, 6/2/45-27/2/45), and 7 differ in date so only 10 agree on date with both lists (very little data in time or location).

Thus, only 113 of the first 150 claims for both list match thus having a high reliability of being accurate claims. 96 of the remaining 171 Wood’s listed claims are even comparable but less reliable with the T&C list lacking in type, time, and location. Of the remaining 31 claims that were compared to Barbas’s work only 11 is comparable but again even less reliable with both lists lacking time and location for many of the claims.

Now this raises an interesting question? Dimitri Khazanov’s wrote an article in respect to Hartmann only gaining 80 victories. I do not have a copy of the article but I have read Jean-Yves Lorant response and it appears that Khazanov’s research is based on the T&Cs list in his effort to confirm the claims. In light of the differences listed above, it’s no wonder Khazanov can only confirm about 80 of Hartmann’s 352 claims using the T&C list.

If anyone has a copy of Khazanov’s article/work I would be interested in getting a copy to determine which of Hartmann’s claims he was able to confirm for his 80 victories?

For those interested, I’ve attached my combined lists that was used in the comparison.

Regards,

Craig...

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Hi Craig,
Thanks for posting your list -- a useful resource, and a good basis for further study.

Regards,
Leon Venter

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Craig-

Thanks much for your detailed and thoughtful response, as well as your revised list of Hartmann's victories, to my query about Hartmann's P-51 victories (or victory). I've realized in the past 10 years that Toliver and Constable's (T&C) writings on Luftwaffe fighter aces and their victories are inconsistent in their accuracy, exacerbated by their lack of rigorous references, and the revision on Hartmann's P-51 credited victories only underscores this. My access to the newer literature on Hartmann is limited, but thanks to you and others on this listserve, as well as the internet, I am starting to gather more recent and accurate information.

This discussion created another question for me; T&C have emphasized in their books that the Luftwaffe system of verifying victories was very rigorous and rendered accurate the credited victory totals of Luftwaffe fighter pilots. Of course, victory lists and totals of some leading Luftwaffe fighter aces, including Rudorffer and Bendert, have recently been shown to be dubious. Donald Caldwell. in his JG 26 War Diaries, has also raised questions as to the veracity of some specific victories of Luftwaffe fighter aces (I don't have the books at hand, but Emil Lang comes to mind). I suspect the victory verification system was not nearly as rigorous as T&C claimed and I am curious as to what others thought about it, especially in comparison to the verification systems of the Americans, British, Russian, and Japanese. I realize this is a very subjective question and a clear-cut answer may not be possible.

Thanks,
Kenneth

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

The system was a good one, and necessary for high command evaluation of battle results, but like any system, rules are only as good as their application or enforcement and the honesty of those charged to do so; as with any human endeavor, this varied according to the mores of each individual involved.

Rob Romero

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

True that. Thanks Rob.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Craig in all fairness(and NOT having read the entire thread JUST yet!) and being slightly tongue in cheek, most LW aces had 'appalling' aircraft IDing skills, it seems.

NM

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Kenneth this is an expanded version of my point refering the Luft victory claim verification system:

The system was a good one, and necessary for high command evaluation of battle results, but like any system, rules are only as good as their application or enforcement and the honesty of those charged to do so; as with any human endeavor, this varied according to the mores of each individual involved. MOREOVER THE ALLIES FACED THE SAME LIMITATIONS IMPOSED BY HUMAN FRAILTY AND SUBJECTIVITY ('I got good hits on the bugger who was smoking when he dove into the overcast, so he MUST have gone down' -Could a wingman comfortably dispell the claim of an adamant Section or Rotte leader when he would want to maintain an amicable relatationship with his superior and would perhaps need confirmation of his own claims later?) -SUCH ISSUES WERE LARGELY RESOLVED THROUGH THE USE OF GUN CAMERAS.

Rob Romero

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

RE: Hartmann vs P-51
I was on the June 24th mission and only 1 P-51 was lost on the Ploesti mission. The other loss was on an Air Sea Rescue escort mission. Welch was hit by light flak in the Pescara, Italy area and crashed into the sea.
For the Ploesti mission, 46 Mustangs took off, 7 were early returns, 39 Mustangs rendezvoused with the B-24s at 0920 hours, 38 Mustangs left bombers at 1021 hours. 38 P-51s down at base at 1530 hours. Claims were
1 Me-109 destroyed 2 FW-190s destroyed 1 IAR 80 Probably destroyed
2 IAR 80 destroyed 2 ME-109s Probably destroyed

I believe the FW-190s were actually IAR 80s

Cordially, Art Fiedler

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Kenneth,

The issue of the Luftwaffe system of verification has been pretty much flogged to death within other discussion threads in this Forum, you might wish to do a search on this to see several different viewpoints. You are correct in your comment that this subject is very subjective as several of these threads ended up being closed by the moderator

For my opinion, I started writing a detailed response to try to justify my opinion and found that I was starting to write an essay. To keep it simple, I believe initially the German system was very rigid but was relaxed during the conflict to help process the backlog of claims (and possibly propaganda). So Robs answer is a very good answer, however I will add that the application of systems change as circumstances change (for good or bad) and I believe that this occurred on both sides during various stages of the war.

Regards,

Craig..

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Nick,

I agree that the Luftwaffe pilots seem to have an aircraft identification problem, just as much as the Allies also had this problem (i.e. Allied claims for Bf109/MC202’s in North Africa). This is one of many reasons that makes it difficult to compare claims to losses.

Regards,

Craig..

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Khazanov doesn't go into the sort of detail you've attempted. I've translated parts of his piece...& the response from Lorant/Ring, which includes detailed quotes from Khazanov's article - therefore the following might be of some interest to you. Ring states that these illustrations "serve to expose the superficial nature of Khazanov's assertions and confirm that his only goal in compiling his article was to discredit Hartmann and his record ...."



A) Hartmann's two victory claims on 20 August 1943.
Combats took place west of Millerowo on that day according to Khazanov who states that "there exists no corresponding loss in the Russian archives" . In actual fact Hartmann claimed his victories in square 88263, ie east of Kuteinikowo, some 160 km south of Millerowo with 7. and 9./JG 52 claiming six Il-2s shot down. During the day some 33 victories were claimed by the Germans, although none in the sector around Millerowo.


B) Hartmann's 100th claimed on 20 September 1943.
According to Khazanov, "German observers noted a LaGG-3 plunging earthwards, while on the Russian side the loss of a Yak-7 of the 288th Fighter Division of the 17th Army was reported.." Khazanov fails to state whether a time was recorded for this loss. At least eleven victories were claimed over the sector where Hartmann was operating that day.


C) "On 29 May 1944 Hartmann claimed three La-5s shot down in the vicinity of the airfield of Roman (Rumania) during a large scale attack by aircraft of the 5th Air Army. All the La-5s of the 302nd Fighter Division returned safely" . False. Hartmann claimed a single Airacobra near Jassy. In addition Hartmann's victories 248-250 claimed on 4 June 1944 were P-39s and not Il-2s


D) "Between 3 and 6 June 1944 Hartmann claimed 15 Airacobras and 8 La-5s" . Incorrect. During these four days of combat Hartmann claimed 22 victories ( 7 La-5s, 2 Yak-9s, 13 Airacobras, of which five were claimed before 15h00).


E) " The Nazi regime needed heroes (...). According to German sources, based on the testimony of Hartmann's wingman Ofw. K. Unger, the famous 'ace' claimed a total of 19 soviet aircraft on 23 and 24 August, including eleven victories on 24 August 1944, while Russian losses amounted to three Airacobras only. The only likely candidate to have been shot down by Hartmann on this date is a single Po-2 of the 208th Night Bomber Division... " .
Khazanov asserts that Hartmann "in no way obtained the exceptional results claimed. At the very least eight of these victories are pure invention..". However Khazanov fails to note that German fighters claimed a total of 24 victories on that date near Sandomierz. No Po-2s feature in these claims. These combats all took place over German-held territory and were thus witnessed.


F) Hartmann apparently shot down a number of German fighters in error. Khazanov quotes a story related to him by Sergei Sikorsky, the son of the famous designer who worked in the BRD (Federal Republic) post war and knew Hartmann well.
Hartmann.. " on occasion the most experienced pilots were obliged to get airborne in the most appalling weather conditions to 'free hunt' . Being able to spot the most basic of landmarks on the desolate Steppe and having absolute mastery of my aircraft were the two factors that enabled me to always return safely. On at least two occasions in bad weather ( once over the Dniepr during the autumn of 1943 ) I attacked and brought down two aircraft. It was only as they were going down that I noted the Balkenkreuze on their wings..needless to say no-one ever knew of this..."
I consider this statement highly unlikely. Hartmann never flew alone and always remained in contact with German ground stations. Any pilot engaging in combat would immediately report the fact over the frequency. G) " one of Hartmann's primary concerns when flying combat sorties was his own personal safety. There are very few bombers among his victims.." An idiotic notion. Attacking bombers was obviously part of the mission if III./JG 52 encountered any in the air. Looking at Hartmann's first 150 victories achieved in 149 combat encounters over the course of his first 391 sorties, 85 of these of these were flown as bomber escort missions, 61 were 'free hunts', 3 were 'Alarm' scrambles and one sortie was designated a bridge protection sortie..Hartmann's scoreboard is the logical consequence of the types of sorties flown and aside from fighters thus comprises, six bombers, nine IL-2s, not forgetting three U-2s and R-5s.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Thanks Rob for your incisive response. In my first response, I hope I did not appear curt or "snarky"; if I did, I apologize for that was not my intention. Your comments are a good reminder that a system devised by humans is subject to change and inconsistency due to circumstances and human inconsistency and frailties. Thanks also for initiating this interesting thread, it has been educational, as are many threads and posts on this forum.

Kenneth

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Thanks Craig. I should have realized that this topic is not new and has been the subject of previous threads and posts, and I should have searched for them. You and Rob Romero make very valid points about verification systems for aerial victories, especially about being subject to human idiosyncrasies and situational circumstance.

Best,
Kenneth

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

quote=FalkeEins;85562]Khazanov doesn't go into the sort of detail you've attempted. I've translated parts of his piece...& the response from Lorant/Ring, which includes detailed quotes from Khazanov's article - therefore the following might be of some interest to you. Ring states that these illustrations "serve to expose the superficial nature of Khazanov's assertions and confirm that his only goal in compiling his article was to discredit Hartmann and his record ...."
[/quote]

For sure Khazanov's article is too poor to prove Hartmann's overclaiming. However, there remain lots of questions. I have already posted some times ago the example of unsubstantiated victories against Aircobras, claimed by Hartmann. They were well confirmed by authorities, though having no background from the opposite side.
Most of the remarks of Lorant/Ring in point of fact criticise mistakes in Hartmann's victory list, that Khazanov based on while writing the article. Eventually, it is not Khazanov's problem that western researchers can not fix the reliable list of Hartmann's claims throughout more than 60 years. From my experience I can say that those obscure "Lagg" hamper identification signifficantly.
Another point here, I know that many members of this board believe that any overstatement in German claims are absolutely impossible and if Soviet records contradict this in some cases, then those records are pure fake. In this case rather rhetorical question emerges, taking TW claims lists and comparing them with Soviet documents, why claims by Barkhorn, Rall, Krupinski, Beisswenger, Wolf, Wolfrum, Schack, Brendel, Lipfert and many others coinside with Soviet records with little exeptions, and those made by Hartmann, Batz, Rudorffer, Lang, Nowotny, Philipp in many cases are missing. I suppose here a malicious campaign against this Luftwaffe pilots :D Soviet authorities deliberately hide info on the planes shot down by those personalities...

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

I do not know about others, but I would be most interested to read a detailed break down of victories of German top aces. Personally, I would love to see Weber and Setz as well. That said, it is all in hands of Russian researchers.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Based on my research and experience, one of the main errors done by many aviation historians - from all sides! - who try to match a certain airman's victory lists with losses from the opposing side, is to look only for crashed or force landed (thus destroyed or severely damaged) aircraft. This is incomplete research. Aircraft damaged in air combat, but returned to friendly territory should also be considered.
Another frequently done error is to discount the ground fire (flak, small arms fire, etc.), which caused a similar number of losses than by fighters and board gunners. However, the feats of the anti-aircraft artillery is usually poorly covered.
All these often overviewed factors should also be counted, for the overall picture to be clearer (it will never be 100% clear anyhow).

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Denes,

Plane with minor battle damage can not be considered an air victory for the opposite side. As regards to Soviet documents it is much easier to recognise such cases, because complete records on losses give concrete definitions for the combat and non combat losses. Such as totally destoryed (failed to return, shot down in combat or by Flak), to this also sorted planes damaged in combat or by flak and made belly landing, that resulted in plane being wrecked and written off as result of this, other gradation is plane being send to factory overhaul, to repair facilities, that resulted in temporary excluding it from unit strength. The last gradation is that plane is to be put under regimental repair, meaning that plane will be repaired in matter of hours, few days.
This last gradation can not surely be an air victory of any German pilot that claim it.


[/quote]

The comparison between losses to flak and to fighters for Soviet side, shows that the latter prevails, at least with regards to fighter planes losses.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

If an aircraft was damaged in air combat, but could be later on repaired, at least gives an indication that an air combat did take place and hits were scored, so the opposite side's claim was not made up. In my point of view, at least.
This, again, should be valid for claims of all sides, not only German.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

No historian has authority to change officially authorised scores, he may only establish it, if it is unknown. Historian is supposed to find out what actually happened, so he should consider even undamaged aircraft. For example if Mr X claimed a victory, following replies should be considered satisfactory: at the time and place following aircraft were lost, at the time and place following aircraft were lost but they are attributed to ground fire, at the time and place following aircraft were damaged, at the time and place fought unit Z and suffered no losses, enemy cannot be established.
Now, over to you, I am looking forward for an article or a book about top German aces of the Eastern Front.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

about Mr. Bernad second point, the aaa. thats indeed very important.

in my researches about kursk there seems to develope following conclusion.

if to compare german fighter claims with soviet losses you will come to bergstroms conlusion of 1:1,25 up to 1:1,33 overclaiming (kursk, p. 118). but if you resarch the (strong) german aaa, you will have an rate of 1:3 overclaiming.

btw if you look at the soviet side, this rate is much higher - around 1:8 exaggeration.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

About Kursk, it must be said that Bergstrom's figures for German losses are too low. Taking the losses one by one, you already get more airplanes destroyed than he did, and yet these figures are not complete. I greatly appreciate Christer Bergstrom's work, but in this case it's not perfect.

The Soviet overclaim rate was undoubtedly higher than that of the Germans' at the time, but the difference is less than what could be deduced from his numbers (I'd say the Soviet overclaimed 5-6 : 1 for the Kursk battle).

Generally speaking, I may be mistaken, but the impression I get from reading a lot about these issues is that the side which is tactically on the defensive is usuallly less accurate in claims. This is also true when many units are involved at the same time.

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

I'd like to thank all of you for your info in this thread.

Joe Harper was my grandfather, and he died when I was still a baby. While I have his medals, etc., I never got to learn this stuff from him. I'll be doing more research about all of this, and will share anything I find.

It's strange to learn that Hartmann was the one who shot him down. I've long been a WWII fighter plane buff, and am currently working on a young adult novel set in 1945 Germany (I write kids' books for a living, though this one is an extracurricular book), so this sort of stuff was on my mind.

Thanks again to everyone who provided info!

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Hello Art -

John Arthur Last of the 31st FG was downed on 24 Jun 1944 while on an Air Sea rescue patrol. A Charles E Welch was downed on 12 Jun 1944 in a P-38. Could you clarify the 24 Jun 1944 incident?

Thank you!

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Hello guys i'm new to this forum, nice research work. About Hartman, I found something wich it's suposed to be he's last interview before his passing in 1993. He clames there at least 5 US Mustangs. Now I don't know what to say about it, could be a fake one? What do you think about it? Here is the link: http://www.hotlinecy.com/hartmann.htm

Re: Erich Hartmann vs. P-51
 

Hello Susank,
I know nothing of the 'Last' incident. The 325th flew escort for a PBY on an Air/Sea rescue mission. Pilots not on the 325th mission to Ploesti escorted the PBY. There were 3 P-51s from the 317th FS, 2 from the 318th FS, and 5 from the 319th FS. The pilot was reported in the sea near Pescara, Italy. Apparently Lt Welsch flew too near the coast and was downed by light flak. The PBY was escorted for 3 hours; however, nothing was reported about the success/failure of the mission.
Cordially, Art Fiedler