Lost during operation Steinbock

[Marcel van Heijkop]

Hi Schalabeer,

Welcome to this forum! I'm working on a book ("Chronik") about the history of I./KG66, the Zielfindergruppe to which Wilhelm Schmidt's Ergänzungsstaffel belonged. I can not add much to Wilhelm Schmidt's personal details as I got most of my info myself from Melvin Brownless (for which a huge thanks again, Melvin!).
However I can add that your relative would have used the so called "EGON-Verfahren" technique to mark the target. With this technique, the aircraft's transponder (FuG25a IFF) is interrogated by 2 Freya radars and it's course plotted on a huge glass table. Corrections are then passed on from the ground station to the aircraft using coded radio or Morse signals.

Regarding the raid itself: The raid on Bristol (target being the Docks area with a subsidiary attack on London) can be regarded as a total failure. Of the 139 bombers sent, 112 were plotted over England and 13 aircraft were lost. Target marking was poor and as a result the bombing was scattered all over Southern England, not a single bomb of the 100 tonnes of bombs hitting the intended targets...

Apart from the Ju 88 S-1 of the Besatzung Schmidt, I./KG66 also lost a Ju 188E of 2./KG66 due to Flak and nightfighter damage, the Besatzung of Lt. Fara finally bailing out near Dunkirk in France. Another Ju 188 of 2./KG66 had to abort the mission because of engine failure.

Hope this helps. I would be very interested to hear from you, please see the PM I sent to you.

Best regards,

Marcel