US Air Force Museum

[chuckschmitz]

Today I visited the USAF Museum in Dayton, Ohio and took a number of photos from their Luftwaffe collection. The first three are at the links below. The caption on the propeller states that it is from a Nightfighter unit and they recorded their victories on it. It looks like the unit says "306." However if that is the unit I can not find it in my limited references.

http://i804.photobucket.com/albums/y...feUniforms.jpg

http://i804.photobucket.com/albums/y...ictoryProp.jpg

http://i804.photobucket.com/albums/y...ictoryProp.jpg

I will post the others, as I get them edited. Hopefully this is not old news for members of this forum.

Chuck

[Delmenhorst]

The unit is 2./Flak Abt.306 (check www.ww2.dk) which was stationed around Flensburg in Schleswig/Holstein. Check also Airwar over Denmark for more information.

[chuckschmitz]

Originally Posted by Delmenhorst

The unit is 2./Flak Abt.306 (check www.ww2.dk) which was stationed around Flensburg in Schleswig/Holstein. Check also Airwar over Denmark for more information.

Do you know which unit it was subordinate to? Thanks. Happy New Year.

[Larry deZeng]

Excuse me for breaking into this, but perhaps I can help. You asked what unit 2./schw.Flak-Abt 306(o) (2nd Battery of Heavy Antiaircraft Detachment/Battalion 306 (stationary)) belonged to. As you can see from this link, http://www.ww2.dk/ground/flak/abt/s306.html , it's impossible to answer that question without an exact date, and extremely difficult to answer for dates prior to about mid-1943. The Luftwaffe's Flakkarten (Flak organizational and deployment charts) begin with the chart for 1.11.43 and end with the chart for 1.12.44. The ones before and those after these dates did not survive the war. Moreover, the Luftwaffe's Flak batteries moved around a lot: sort of "here today, gone tomorrow". However, this particular Abteilung (306) was stationary and did not move around much, so it was probably deployed around Flensburg from 1941 until it moved to Lübeck in June 1944. As the link shows, a Flak-Abt. was typically subordinated to an ever changed number of Flak-Regimenter, which in turn were subordinated to a Flak-Division.

That's about all that can be squeezed out of this without additional information.

L.

[chuckschmitz]

Thanks so much for the reply. Certainly better info from you than the sign at the museum which attributed the prop and victories to a flying unit. Happy New Year.

[John Beaman]

Hi Chuck:

One of the things you must learn about the USAF Museum is they care nothing about the accuracy of their "restorations". They care about what "looks cool" to US audiences.

Some years back I pointed out the then director that the Bf 109G-10 they have in the markings of JG 300 was not accurate in that the aircraft is a WNF-built G-10 and we knew the history of the aircraft as it was surrendered by II./JG 52 in May 1945. We even know the exact markings for the machine. He made it quite bluntly clear that he did not care about that. They wanted the markings of a 109 that "flew against the 8th AF", so they took those JG 300 markings from a photo of a Erla-built G-10. I guess JG 300 is considered "bigger and badder" than JG 52. Historical accuracy did not mean anything to him. He made it quite clear that they were tailoring exhibits as "themes" for US visitors.

[Larry deZeng]

The Museum has two missions: (1) to project the Air Force message for use as a recruiting and PR tool, and (2) as a cash cow, although the amount generated barely merits mention. Today, this appears to be unchanged from when I was last there in June 1968.

[chuckschmitz]

The accuracy question is certainly not a new issue with me. I have heard it from others. I know one of the P-39s is also in the wrong colors for the type. I believe there are also problems with the Spit and Beaufighter as well. I'll get the Bf 109 links posted soon and everyone can really jump in. I'm only and hour and a half away so its' still worth the drive.
Maybe they should check some of the reference material they sell in the shop.

[harrison987]

Yeah the entire Me109 restoration was a mockery (along with the Evergreen 109). They restored both side by side, re-skinned all of them, and re-painted everything in a nice duck egg blue. They did not care much about accuracy. If someone was smart, they would buy at least one, tear it apart, and then "re-restore" it, back to how it should have looked...not they shambles they created.