Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Dear Gentelman,

any chance that Luftwaffe reports exist on this event?

I would appreciate any help.

Sincerely,

Marko Jeras
Zagreb, Croatia

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Marko -

Here is all I have ever been able to find on this date in the Zagreb area. You might be able to find some further mention of it in the British National Archives (BNA) or the U.S. National Archives (NARA), but it wouldn't be much .


11 October 1944
"Balkan Air Force Mustangs, in a search for air targets in the Zagreb area, found a single-engine biplane which they attacked. The biplane was seen to crash and burn out. Five miles north of Glina, another biplane was attacked and claimed as destroyed. A Do 17, observed by Balkan Air Force Beaufighters in the Zagreb area, was destroyed in a combined action with the Mustangs."
[Source: Balkan Air Force History, mimeographed, HQ Balkan Air Force, 1945.]


The biplanes were probably Luftwaffe He 46s or CR 42s, but they could have been Croatian biplanes, too. The Do 17 was almost certainly Croatian or a Croatian Legion aircraft.

Hope that helps.

L.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

I am happy to hear from you! Thank you for data!

Event that I research was Day Ranger mission of three RAF no. 605. Squadron Mosquitos.

Possibly aerial photos taken two days later might reveal damage done.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Is it possible that you have a wrong date? One day before (10 Oct 1944) was:
1944-10-10, 2./NSGr. 7, Fiat Cr 42, 9199, 9 schw, Lapovo
Flugzeugführer Ofw Bormann, Walter, +
Absturz und Aufschlagbrand infolge Feindbeschuß. Bruch 100 %.
1944-10-10, 2./NSGr. 7, Fiat Cr 42, 9221, 20 schw, Kalinovac
Flugzeugführer Ofw Rauer, Helmuth, +
Notlandung infolge Feindbeschuß. Bruch 90 %.
1944-10-10, NASt. Kroatien, Do 17 Z, 3240, 9H+EL, 5 km ostnordöstlich Griz, 55 km östlich Agram (Zagreb)
Flugzeugführer (Staffelkapitän) Hptm Stark, Georg, verletzt
Beobachter (Ia Fl.Führ.Nordbalkan) Major Lube, Paul, verletzt
Bordfunker Uffz Weise, Ernst, +
Bordmechaniker Gefr Fischer, Helmut, verletzt
Absturz nach Luftkampf. Bruch 100 %.

Matti

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

I don't know if you can find a Luftwaffe report but the war diary of Heeresgruppe F is available online for this period and should include reports on air activity.

The link below will show you the Lagebericht of 11 October 1944, written the next day:
http://znaci.net/NARA/T316.php?broj=...c=311&roll=194
A Mosquito attack on Agram is noted, but apparently was after a first strafing attack from a formation returning from an attack on Wien, so probably 15th Air Force P-51s or P-38s. At least that is what the Germans were then thinking.

You can search surrounding pages for maybe more details.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

I have also this for 10 October 1944:

"When construction of the Graf Zeppelin was resumed in 1942 the Ju 87C took over the role as a reconnaissance bomber, and torpedo bombers were no longer seen to be needed. Nine of the existing Fi 167 were sent to a coastal naval squadron in the Netherlands and then returned to Germany in the summer of 1943. After that they were sold to Croatia, where their short-field and load-carrying abilities (under the right conditions, the aircraft could descend almost vertically) made it ideal for transporting ammunition and other supplies to besieged Croatian Army garrisons between their arrival in September 1944 and the end of the War.

During one such mission, near Sisak on 10 October 1944, the Fi 167 WNr 4808 of the Croatian Air Force flown by eight-victories Croat ace Bozidar Bartulovic and his gunner Mate Jurkovic was attacked by five P-51 Mustang III of 213 Sqn RAF. Jurkovic had the distinction of claiming one of the Mustangs shot down - possibly one of the last bi-plane "kills" of the war - before itself being shot down. Bartulovic reported that five fighters made two passses on him, setting the aircraft alight and wounding him in the head. Both Croat men bailed out.

Three pilots of 213 Sqn, Sqn Ldr Clifford Vs, Sgt W E Mould and Sgt D E Firman claimed a single-engined biplane shot down over Martinska Ves but the Mustang III KH554 of Sgt W.E. Mould was hit by the return fire and was wrecked in a crash-landing 3 miles northeast Martinska Ves, Yugoslavia.

Source:
http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/archiv...hp?t-2979.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fieseler_Fi_167
http://mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk/...ses/losses.htm (no more online)
http://home.att.net/~jbaugher/1944_1.html
"Osprey Aircraft of the Aces 49: Croatian Aces of World War 2", by Boris Ciglic. ISBN 1-84176-435-3
http://maps.google.fr/maps?hl=fr&q=Martinska%20Ves%20Croatie"

From the above Croat and German losses, it seems that the Balkan Air Force History text, while giving the date of 11 October, actually describes events taking place on the 10th. Maybe it is a report written on the 11th and describing what happened the day before (as many military reports) ?

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Zagreb 10–19 October 1944


Balkan Air Force - 10 October 1944
In YUGOSLAVIA 21 fighters and 18 Beaufighters scored hits on the barracks and railway centre at KRIZ. One 500-ton trawler was set on fire. One Do 217 and two enemy bi-planes were destroyed in combat. One Beaufighter and one Mustang are missing.

Balkan Air Force - 11 October 1944
31 aircraft of BAF attacked targets in Yugoslavia. (Nothing further said.)

Balkan Air Force - 12 October 1944
46 Spitfires and Beaufighters attack enemy shipping and other targets along the Dalmatian coast. Two Beaufighters failed to return. (There were no attacks inland, including the Zagreb area.)

Balkan Air Force - 13 October 1944
26 Baltimores and Venturas against Split and other ports along the Dalmatian coast. 46 fighters and 6 R.P. aircraft on armed reconnaissance inland where they claimed two locomotives and 5 M.T. (Nothing further said.)

Balkan Air Force - 14 October 1944
BAF flew 98 sorties against targets in YUGOSLAVIA and GREECE. (Nothing further said.)


This was pursued through 19 October and there was no mention of the Zagreb area or anything fitting the mission you are interested in. Strangely, "Mosquito(s)" operating in the MTO was not mentioned once during this 10 day period. All of the reports for all air commands in the Mediterranean were reviewed: MAAF, MSAF, MTAF, MCAF, BAF.

[SOURCE: Duty Group Captain's Daily Resumé of Air Operations. Nos. 1761, 1762, 1763, 1764, 1765, 1766, 1767, 1768, 1769, 1770.]

L.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

All -

The reference cited has two pages on the 11 October 1944 mission, covering both the 15th AAF bombers and fighters. It says 8 Liberators from the 484th Bomb Group attacked the railroad bridge at Dravograd/Yugoslavia and 5 more bombed a bridge over the Sava River near Dobova. The 15th AAF's fighters did a lot of ground strafing but it was all in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Austria - none in Yugoslavia. No mention of any activity in the Zagreb area two days before or two days after either, nor any mention of any Mosquitos buzzing around. So it seems that the information in the Heeresgruppe E/F Tagesmeldung - Luftlage should be approached with some skepticism.

Mahoney, Kevin A. Fifteenth Air Force Against the Axis: Combat Missions Over Europe During World War II. Lanham (MD): The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2013. ISBN: 978-0-8108-8494-6. Hb with laminated cover. 485p. Illus. (a few photos). Maps. Appendices (4). Glossary. Source Notes. Bibliography. Index.

L.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

As RAF used Mustangs over Yugoslavia, maybe the Germans thought they were American and so part of the Vienna force.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Gentelman,
who performed attack is not the issue. Neither date.

Subject is the damage assessment. Damage of Luftwaffe planes, that is.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

You have to have puzzle pieces to make a puzzle .

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Frame is complete. And most of the middle. Only few detail pieces are still searched for. ;o)

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

The Luftwaffe losses summaries database cover two of these, N.S.Gr.7 and Nahaufkl.St. Kroatien. According to the base both had losses on the 10th (1 aircraft shot down by enemy aircraft for Nahaufkl.St. Kroatien, 1 shot down by AA fire, and 3 damaged (by enemy aircraft, by infantry fire and without enemy action) for N.S.Gr.7) but none on the 11th.

This base is in 1944 one of the two main sources for Luftwaffe base with the NVM (that cover only case with personnel losses), but still you can see in this example that it is not complete: Matti had in the NVMs two aircraft destroyed for 2./NSGr. 7 on 10 October, while the base had only one.

Still the base will usually list ground losses too, listing some for Nahaufkl.St. Kroatien on 12 Nov 1943, 6 Apr 1944, 23 Apr 1944, 25 May 1944, 26 May 1944, 28 May 1944, 1 June 1944 and 19 January 1945. None at all are listed for N.S.Gr.7. Maybe the data is incomplete here too.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Hello,

Ian Piper, author of, We Never Slept The Story of 605 Squadron (Author, 1997 rep.) states:

" On October 10th (1944), 605 dispatched three Mosquitoes even further afield on a 2,500 mile trip deep into occupied territory to attack two German held airfields 60 miles south of Prague, Czechoslovakia and another two at Zagreb in Jugoslavia. The three crews consisted of the CO, W/Cdr Mitchell with F/Lt Stan Hatsell, S/Ldr Ian McCall with F/Sgt Tommy Caulfield and F/Lt Jack Pengelly with F/Sgt Couchman. The three departed Manston on the morning of the 10th and called at Istres (Grouppe 3 East) for fuel and a weather report . They night stopped at Jesi in Italy before setting off the following morning in an inverted vic three formation, passing over Ancona on course for their first target of Zagreb where W/Cdr Mitchell damaged an Me 110 which Jack Pengelly finished off.

Jack also shared a B.71 with Ian McCall before the CO called up ordering the three to leave the area and set course for the aerodrome at Pleso Where Jack destroyed destroyed an Me 109 and the CO claimed two Junkers Ju 87's and Ian McCall a Ju 52. As they broke away from the airfield 'Mitch' called up and said that he had been hit, so Jack and Ian formed up on him and escorted him safely back to Jesi, where they found that all three aircraft had been damaged by flak."

See:
"We Never Slept" The Story of No. 605 (County of Warwick) Squadron Royal Auxiliary Air Force 1926 - 1957.
Piper,Ian
Tamworth(Staff.):Author,1997 (rep.)
p.201

The Players:

62259 W/C Richard Angelo 'Mitch' MITCHELL DFC*/151901 F/L Stanley Harry HATSELL DFC
39321 S/L Ian Frederick McCALL/F/Sgt T 'Tommy' CAULFIELD
60295 F/L John Isaac PENGELLY DFC/F/Sgt C R COUCHMAN

Col.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Splendid digging, Colonel. Strange how these obscure gems turn up even though they are not mentioned in the usual places.

However, one thing does bother me. Why would they have sent three Mosquitos all the way from RAF Station Manston/U.K. via S France and NE Italy to bomb a couple of obscure and relatively unimportant airfields around Zagreb? We certainly had enough air assets in the Mediterranean by October 1944 to handle this operation, and the 4 Zagreb area airfields Gorica, Lucko, Pleso and Stadt) were under 'round-the-clock surveillance and frequent air attack. (see: http://ww2.dk/Airfields%20-%20Yugoslavia.pdf - under Agram (Zagreb).

Was there any mention in your 605 Squadron history of there suddenly being a vital or very important target there that needed to be eliminated, and that only Mosquitos brought down from England could perform this mission because of the need for utmost secrecy and/or special on-board equipment that no aircraft in the Mediterranean Theater had?

Most perplexing.

L.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Larry, I had the same question. Why send UK-based Mosquitoes to Croatia ?

I wonder if it was ordered at high level or decided at Squadron level, the idea of the level being to go where "game was to be found". Some days before, crews of 605 Sqn flew other Day Rangers to Vienna (on the 7th) and to the Baltic (on the 2nd). I wonder also if with most of the Luftwaffe back in Germany the usual area for Day Ranger (Denmark, Baltic) was not becoming too dangerous and Mosquitoes went to other areas for this reason. It seems to me that Day Rangers stopped after October 1944, maybe 605 Sqn crews try to score as most as possible before they were ordered to stop these operations ?

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Don't know for 605 Sqn here, but over Denmark the Mosquitoes used were FB.VI fighter-bombers type, without radar or any special electronic device AFAIK.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

That is right question!
All three Mosquitos were FB VI and attack was performed with 20 mm cannons. No bombs.
Mission was Daylight Ranger (attack on tagets of opportunity) in Budapest area.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Boris Ciglić and Dragan Savić in their book 'Dornier Do 17 - The Yugoslav story' state that on Borongaj aerodrome one Croatian Do 17E of 3. zrakoplovno jato burned out completely and one Ca.311 of 15. zrakoplovno jato was destroyed (missidentified as Avia B.71 by Mossie crew).

Croatian People's Protection (Narodna zaštita) unit report state that one Dorier plane was set on fire on Borongaj aerodrome and one three-engine plane ignited on Pleso aerodrome.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Laurent and Marko:

Very interesting thoughts and comments along with additional details. What came to my mind an hour or two ago was the possibility that the Mossies were after a VIP and his entourage. Borongaj (Agram-Stadt to the Germans) was the principal Croatian Air Force airfield in the Zagreb area, while Zagreb-Pleso was the gateway airfield at that time (Oct 44) for many of the evacuation transport flights between Athens, Salonika and Belgrade and north to Austria and Germany. Is it possible a German or Croatian message transmitted by radio was intercepted by the Allies to the effect that: (1) a high-ranking German general would be passing through Pleso at the time of the attack, or, (2) that Poglavnik would departing or arriving at Borongaj? If so, the Allies might have seen this as a prime opportunity to liquidate them. Just speculating, but it almost sounds from what we have so far that the Mosquitos were intentionally targeting transports or multi-engine aircraft that could be used as a transport.

L.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Hello,

Markojeras, please excuse the momentary diversion from your original question.

Larry, The 605 Sqn history offers no reasoning behind these ops, other than the enormous success they had with them. The 7 October 1944 op to Vienna is a case in point. 605 Sqn dispatched two aircraft*, firstly to Fischamend Markte, then later attacking Muenchendorf, destroying 9 aircraft and damaging 2 (there is a detailed breakdown of these claims). Fires were still burning at Fischamend airfield from an earlier attack by Italian-based bombers. The area was also covered by smoke.

*
Crews:

126815 F/L Arnold John CRAVEN/1801629 F/Sgt Leonard William WOODARD (FTR 31/10/1944)
61463 S/L Leonard William Henry WELCH DFC/521280 F/Sgt Leonard Robert PAGE DFM*

For Craven/Woodard, see: http://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/i...supplement/275

Col.

Re: Straffing on Fliegerhorst Agram and Pleso on 11. October 1944.
 

Thanks for that, Colonel.

Mosquito intruder raids on enemy airfields are well documented in both Allied and German records, but I was unaware of any going this far afield, i.e., two stops for av petrol and a RON or two. That really signals an ulterior purpose for this mission. I guess it will remain one of the little unresolved mysteries of World War II.

L.