[Steve49]

Andrzej

A post raid naval report (TNA ADM199/1079) list the following claims:

BLEASDALE: 1x Ju88
BERKELEY: 1x Ju88
BROCKLESBY: 1xFw190
SLAZAK: 1x Fw190
ALRESFORD: 1x Fw190
LOCUST: 1x Ju88
CH43: 1x Fw190
SGB8 + SGB9: Shared 1x Fw190
MGB312: 1x Fw190
MGB320: 1x Do17
ML292 + ML190: Shared 1x Do17
LCF6: 2x Ju88
LCT318: 1x Fw190

Obviously other reports give ships more claims (ie the four for Slazak). Additionally one landing craft crew (LCA285 from HMS Duke of Wellington) reported shooting down a Ju88 with a Lewis gun (the gunner AB N. Mitchinson had a MiD for it), the port wing was apparently 'shot off'.

In almost all of these cases it is impossible to determine which are genuine and which are for aircraft that had already been crippled in aerial combat or those that escaped with little or no damage. Additionally the first wave of smoke laying aircraft were heavilly engaged by the Allied naval force as well as the Dieppe defences, but again it is impossible to determine who caused what damage (In an early report Slazak claimed on 'twin-engined bomber' at 05.17-obviously an RAF light bomber-unfortunately at the moment I can't find the document I found this in).

The one case that I have been able to match up a loss with a claim is that made by SGB8/SGB9. Whilst operating to the west of Dieppe the ships were attacked 2x Fw190 from 10./JG2, a near missed temporailly disabled SGB9, but returned fire damaged both aircraft (flown by Fw Blase and Uffz Magarin- additonal details from C. Goss 'Luftwaffe fighter-bombers over Britain'), causing one (0272- Flown by Uffz Magarin) to crash land near Palvel with 20% damage. Obviously not the shotdown aircraft claimed by the gunboats and not the 'Cruiser' claimed by the pilot, but the area and times match up.

From my figures the days losses were as follows:

RAF/USAAC: 106 aircraft destroyed/written off (137+ damaged)

Spitfire Vb x 55 (61+ damaged)
Spitfire VI x 3 (1 damaged)
Spitfire IX x 7 (1 damaged)
Hurricane II x 21 (33+ damaged)
Typhoon IIb x 2
Mustang Ia x 10 (10 damaged)
Boston III x 6 (17 damaged)
Blenhiem IV x 2 (11 damaged)
B17 x 0 (3 damaged)

Luftaffe: 48 aircraft destroyed/written off (33+ damaged)

Bf109G x 4 (2 damaged)
Fw190A x 17 (13 damaged)
Me210A-1 x 0 (1 damaged)
He111 x 1 (1 damaged)
Ju88A x 6 (2 damaged)
Ju88D x 1 (1 damaged??)
Do217E x 19 (14 damaged)

Despite the desparity in aircraft losses more Luftwaffe aircrew were actually lost than RAF/USAAC. 78 killed/8 POW v 63 killed/21 POW; obviously a reflection on the terrible losses suffered by the poorly escorted bombers of Luftflotte 3, notably KG2.

Regards,

Steve