JG 301 mission on 17 Dec 44

[Don Caldwell]

Thanks, Erich --

Your suggestion that the correct date is 23 Dec looks like a good one. I can't match your 20 years of research, but will match up what Reschke says for the 17th with what I have for the 23rd and report back to all.

Horrido!

Don

[Erich]

sure go ahead .......

E ~

[Don Caldwell]

Hi Dragondog --

I can accept that 9 AF units were up on 17 Dec despite the bad weather, but that is irrelevant WRT my basic question of the JG 301 mission as described by Reschke -- JG 301 would not have flown from Berlin to battle tactical aircraft over the western front, on 17 Dec or any other date. I'm thinking Erich has solved my problem, but am checking my 23 Dec data for uh-ohs.

Don

[Kutscha]

SATURDAY, 23 DECEMBER 1944

STRATEGIC OPERATIONS (Eighth Air Force): 2 missions are flown.
Mission 757: 423 bombers and 636 fighters are dispatched to hit marshalling yards, communication centers and a rail junction in the rear of the battle area; 75-150 Luftwaffe aircraft are encountered and the AAF claims 75-5-23; 7 fighter are lost:

1. 148 of 153 B-17s hit the marshalling yard at Ehrang; 45 B-17s are
damaged; 1 airman is KIA and 1 WIA. Escorting are 54 of 62 P-51s; they claim 20-0-3 aircraft without loss.

2. 113 B-24s are sent to bomb communication centers at Ahrweiler (48),
Junkerath (31) and Dahlem (27); 74 B-24s are damaged; 3 airmen are WIA.
Escort is provided by 243 of 254 P-51s; they claim 1-0-0 aircraft; 1 P-51 is
lost (pilot MIA) and 1 damaged beyond repair.

3. 152 B-17s are dispatched to hit marshalling yards at Homburg (58) and
Kaiserslautern (40) and the rail junction at Homburg; 6 others hit targets
of opportunity; they claim 6-4-5 aircraft; 77 B-17s are damaged; 1 airman is WIA and 7 MIA. Escorting are 112 of 117 P-51s; they claim 2-0-0 aircraft without loss.

4. 6 of 6 B-17s fly a screening mission.

5. 163 P-47s and P-51s fly a fighter sweep of the Bonn, Germany area; they claim 46-1-15 aircraft; 3 P-47s and 3 P-51s are lost (all pilots MIA).

6. 20 P-51s fly a scouting mission without loss.

Mission 758: 5 B-17s and 7 B-24s are dispatched to drop leaflets in France,
the Netherlands and Germany during the night; only 10 aircraft drop leaflets. The 374th, 375th and 376th Fighter Squadrons, 361st Fighter Group, based at Little Walden, England with P-51s, begin operating from St Dizier, France; the 486th and 487th Fighter Squadrons, 352d Fighter Group, based at Bodney, England, begin operating from Asch, Belgium with P-51s.

[Don Caldwell]

Here's some of my data that appear relevant to the hypothesis that JG 301 flew on 23 Dec 44:

1. JG 301 losses -- none in the RLM "Strichliste" (BA-MA RL 2 III/xxx) - this proves nothing either way, of course.

2. JG 301 claims -- none in the RLM claims microfilms -- this proves nothing either way, either; these have just about played out by this date.

3. 8th AF 2nd BD activity (this was the B-24 command) -- the INTOPS Summary for this date says 113 B-24s were dispatched against commo targets at Junkerath, Dahlem, and Ahrweiler. E/a opposition: nil; losses: nil. These targets were serving the Ardennes offensive and were fairly close to the battle lines -- nowhere near Kassel, at any rate.

So from my data, 23 Dec 44 doesn't look like a good replacement for Reschke's 17 Dec 44. Erich, please come back.

One possibility that hasn't been addressed here is a small RAF Bomber Command day raid -- Lancs and Mustang IIIs instead of B-24s and P-51s -- that didn't find its way into Middlebrook. Any RAF BC experts out there? The date of such a raid, as far as I'm concerned, is open.

Horrido!

Don

[Horst Weber]

Good evening Don !

As you mentioned, both dates don't seem to match up. When the Ardennes offensive was launched on Dec. 16th 1944, the Luftwaffe Fighter units had been rebuilt powerful to support this mission. There were many missions of Luftwaffe Figgter units on Sunday, December 17th 1944 in the Ardennes area. But only there !.

The same on Dec. 23rd 1944. All in all, more tan 2,000 a/c of both sides were in the air, but mostly around the Ardennes and tactical targets relating to the Ardennes. There were missions in Southern Germany by 12th AF, but no around Hannover-Kassel.

The date of Reschke's report must be checked, since Dec. 17th doesn't seem to be realistic as well as Dec. 23rd.

All the best !

Horst Weber

[Don Caldwell]

Hallo Horst!

Sending one of the few RLV day units from the Berlin area all the way to the Ardennes battlefront would seem illogical, but we know that this is exactly what happened on 24 Dec to both JG 300 and JG 301. So JG 301 could have been ordered all the way to the Ardennes area on the 23rd. Reschke's Hannover-Kassel locations cannot be taken literally; they seem to have gotten stuck in his head and are used several places in his book where they don't belong. But in my mind, an additional problem with Erich's hypothesis that Reschke's 17 Dec should really be 23 Dec is Reschke's time of takeoff -- 1055 hours -- when the HBs had not even cleared England (their TOTs were 1223-52). I'm working with Erich off-line on the problem, and hope to report back to all if anything gets resolved.

Horrido!

Don

[Nick Beale]

For what it's worth 37 years after publication, Werner Girbig's "Six Months to Oblivion" (aka «Start im Morgengrauen») devotes a section to 17 December 1944. After describing the actions over the Ardennes, he talks of JG 300 taking on B-24s coming up from the Gulf of Trieste over SE Germany and the Sudetenland. He says JG 300 lost 23 aircraft and pilots but doesn't mention JG 301.

[Don Caldwell]

Hi Nick --

None of the "official" data mention any sort of mission by JG 301 vs the 15th AF (or anyone else) on 17 Dec, and Reschke's description of a mission to the west against heavy bombers is up against the Allied records, which state that the 8th AF heavies didn't fly. "23 Dec" has been proposed as the true date of this mission, but if Reschke's 1055 takeoff time is correct, catching the 8th AF, which bombed Ardennes commo targets at 1230, & returning to Stendal, which his memoir implies, would have required an impossibly-long 3+ hour mission, and his stated encounter locations are nowhere near the Ardennes. (Plus, the B-24s reported no e/a sightings.) Another possibility is that "17 Dec" was not a separate mission at all, but should be conflated with 24 Dec or 31 Dec; Reschke's memory might have played him tricks, and split out part of one of those missions as a distinct set of events.

Gad, this is fun.

Don

[Horst Weber]

Good evening Don & Nick !

What's about Dec. 12th, 15th and 18th missions of Eighth AF ?

Horst Weber