[ianatheling]

Thank you to Guy for sending me the document that he referred to. The document is from Free-French intelligence sources. It records aircraft spotted at Montpellier on the 27.11.1943 and again on the 5.12.1943. It must be noted that the skills of the amateur aircraft spotter were not accurate and there were errors made. The most obvious was an aircraft spotted on the 27.11 and listed as a ‘Heinkel’ coded 1H+FO. By the 5.12 this aircraft had transformed itself into a Ju 88! Many TOCH members will also be aware that the French spotter must have also miss-recorded the code, since ‘O’ was never used as a staffel identifier.

Some other recorded codes offer insufficient information to provide meaningful identifications. Accepting these reservations I have attempted to make some observations on what was recorded.
27/11
‘Junkers 88’ 1H+FD and CD Ju 88A of Stab.III/KG 26 which was based at Montpellier at this time.
1H+XA Ju 88A code of Stab./KG 26, (which were converting from He 111).
1H+UF Ju 88A KG 26 incorrectly recorded code.
‘Heinkel’ 1H+FO Could be a He 111H of KG 26, but incorrectly recorded code.
‘Storch’ +N Fi 156, but impossible to identify unit.
+RU Unclear whether this is listed as a ‘Storch’ or a ‘Stuka’. Possibly an aircraft of a 10 staffel, unknown unit.
‘Stuka’ SO+TR Looks like a stkz, but not recorded. SO+FR was a Ju 87D ?
15+TR One of four Bf 109’s recorded to have landed on this date and apparently the aircraft which crashed with death of the pilot. As stated in earlier post, this is almost certainly a numerical tactical code which has partially covered an earlier stkz. No obvious unit, but it could be possible to find in loss records?

5/12
Junkers 88, 1H+AT, BT, CT, FT, IT, ZT all 9./KG 26
Junkers 88, 1H+IR 7./KG 26
Junkers 88, 1H+CS 8./KG 26.....all part of III./KG 26 based at this airfield.
Junkers 88, 1H+ZU 10./KG 26, perhaps a replacement aircraft from IV to III./KG 26
Junkers 88, 1H+FO incorrect code as noted above.
‘Stuka’ SO+TR as above.
‘Storch’ +U and +T Two more unidentifiable Fi 156.#

Ian