Rall's claims
 

I was searching Tony Wood's claims in the west for Guenther Rall and saw that a P-38 on the 29Apr44 was victory #274. Didn't he shoot down Lt Col. Preston Piper's P-47 and Lt Willard Johnson's P-47 from the 56FG on the 12May44 or only one of them?

Rall's Claims
 

Hello Nokose

I remember that in one of his online articles Christer Bergström stated that the P-38 fighter in question belonged to the 364th FG. From this it would appear that Rall only got one P-47 fighter of the 56th FG on 12 May 1944 yet in one interview I read he claimed he shot down two fighters in that particular engagement. Rather odd and another minor mystery that would be nice to clear up.

Horrido!

Leo

Re: Rall's claims
 

Hallo,

in an old book on the life of H.Zemke, he (his own formation of 4 P-47 was attacked by Rall) sustained that Rall downed 2
P-47, so for him the total for Rall is 276....later the two former enemies become friends

Alessandro

Re: Rall's claims
 

Leo & Alessandro,
Yes, I remember reading Zemke's story and an interview that Rall gave on the incident. I looked on Luftwaffe.cz and it doesn't have a complete list of his victories but does list 271 as being in the east and 4 in the west. So maybe the number in Tony's list is wrong but what, where ,when and who is the 4th?

Rall's Claims
 

Hi Nokose

Just in case that you might be interested, here is what I have on Rall, including his victory list as of now. I am not sure that everything is 100% correct but hopefully it may help you.

http://rapidshare.com/files/222861815/Rall.zip.html

Horrido!

Leo

Re: Rall's claims
 

Leo,
Interesting! His first was a French fighter in the west. Still we have 3 USAAF fighters that are known to have been shot down which would put his score at 276 instead of 275. He must have not received credit for one of the 56FG P-47's on that last mission. I've found a few more eastern front that I'll post later.

Re: Rall's claims
 

IIRC 11 P-47s were claimed by Rall's unit on 12 May 44, so as usual this issue is more complicated one might like.

Re: Rall's claims
 

Rob,
There probably were 11 claims for P-47's shot down. I'm sure that Rall's wingman was the witness for 275 but he didn't seem to have been around keeping the two P-47's off Rall as he went after Zemke. Also the other claims didn't have members of the 56FG to verify their claim.

Re: Rall's claims
 

Gentlemen,

if you compare the MACRs of the regarding P-47 losses on 12.05.1944, it looks like the three a/c of 56.FG belong to the three claims of JG 5 (Krupinski, Jahn, Lieberknecht).

According to German records, all these P-47 crashed in the area between Mannheim and Heidelberg (Grid Sqare TS), exactly (in time AND area) where JG 5 claimed three P-47 (all confirmed) and lost one 109 (Lieberknecht) to "Thunderbolts".

P-47 42-26025, 78.FG was shot down by 6./JG 1 (Oblt. Buchholz) over the Moselle (confirmed), so there's no P-47 left for Günther Rall...

IMHO and according to all known American and German sources, there's no matchable loss for Ralls two claims (and for the whole Rall - Zemke story) on this day.

Nevertheless, I can confirm the 56.FG's claims of Rall, Kutzera and Kastenhuber, because the locations and circumstances of these losses are known.

Hope this helps

Heuser

Re: Rall's claims
 

I never met Zemke, Rall and the other 56FG members involved but it's kind of hard to believe that they just met and decided to make up this story to give Rall credit that day.

Re: Rall's claims
 

I think none of the involved had seen the official accounts from both sides about claims and losses for this day - I've send you a PM...

Best regards

Heuser

Re: Rall's claims
 

Very good argument of the case. The claim (275) could be a mistake involving the attack on Zemke's P-47 considering the condition Rall was in on bail out. Still the the story of Zemke and any 56FG member that witnessed is hard to just dismiss. The one possiblity is that the two loss P-47 were hit so fast that their attackers weren't noticed as Rall entered the picture

Re: Rall's claims
 

Nokose, Rall had nothing to do with the three losses of 56.FG on this day - the crash locations of Rall and the P-47's of 56.FG were 80 km from eachother (Kutzera and an anknown pilot's a/c crashed only a few km away from Rall).

Several 109-units had losses in the area between these crashsides, f.e. JG 3, JG 5, JG 27 and JG 53. The closest crashside of a US-fighter is the one of Robert L. Shoup, 354.FG, P-51C 42-102997.

I've checked the German NVLs, the US MACR including the KU-files, the unit histories of JG 11 and the 56.FG, Ralls "Flugbuch" and several eyewitness reports regarding the combats on this day (so I know even the name of the woman who gave first aid to Rall), and I know more or less the exact crashsides of three a/c of Stab II./JG 11 on this day.

The only thing which didn't match is the "Rall -Zemke"-Story - including the locations mentioned in the US sources.

Heuser

Re: Rall's claims
 

So the 275th claim is made up on a falsehood or mistake and verified by post-war memiors.

Since you've seen his flugbuch can tell if his 2nd victory was as wingman on 24Jun41? There were 12 claims by III/JG52 for DB-3F's. Denes Bernard's book has one being claimed by flak. The actual VVS loss was 3 DB-3F's by 2 MTAP CHF and 7 SB by 40 SBAP CHF. With Friedrich Wachowiak's 1st possibly only being damaged.

Re: Rall's claims
 

Heuser,

If you have access to original flight book of Rall, could you please confirm that most his claims for 1943-44 are marked as simple "LaGG" without any precise type?

TIA.

Re: Rall's claims
 

Sorry Gentlemen;

I spoke about "Mein Flugbuch" / "My Logbook", published by NeunundzwanzigSechs...

http://www.neunundzwanzigsechs.de/