22 Aug 44 P-47 near Tours sur Marne (nr Athis)

[hautemarnechris]

Hello Rob and Larry

just had some news from the folks at the Vraux airfield museum.

They say there was an airfield equi-distant from Tours-sur-Marne, Plivot and Athis. It was built by the Germans as a satellite of Plivot and enabled them to conceal aircraft in the woods to the South of Bisseuil - something they couldn't do at Plivot which is/was located in open farmland.

Attached (I hope) is a US report on the airfield after it was servicable.

Attachment 7886

The coordinates were 49deg 01 58N, 4deg 05 48E. I think you can make out the line of the runway on Google Earth.

It fits most of the information I have - (1) the Ultra decrypts refer to it as either "Athis" or "Athis Plivot" (2) An Ultra decrypt says it was located between the river Marne and the railway (3) The pilot in Rob's combat describes it as "Tours-sur-Marne" (4) My agent's report describes it as "Tours" by which he almost certainly meant Tours-sur-Marne.

The Wikapedia entry for Athis is I think incorrect or perhaps describes an additional airfield closer to Athis. The entry describes the airfield as located to the Southeast of Athis - the airfield the Vraux museum folk told me about was located to the northeast of Athis. Also the concrete runway it mentions seems to be incorrect as are the co-ordinates given in the entry and also the date on which it became operational again. I suspect they found a section of concrete, assumed it was a fragment of the old airfield and used its lat/longs for the location of Athis airfield. I suppose it's just possible that the entry is referring to the original Plivot airfield which, according to Wikapedia, was rebuilt closer to Plivot after the war. But that doesn't fit with Larry's airfield intelligence summary.

Larry's allied airfield intelligence info look as though the airfield might not have been known (although I think that's unlikely).

But the new information does look promising. II./Jg 3 seem to have left Athis/Plivot /Tours-sur-Marne on the 21st August but two pilots were reported in Ultra as "detached" - perhaps one of them was Obergefreiter Dorn who made the combat report on the 22nd August. Alternatively, II./Jg 3 actually left on the afternoon of the 22nd.

I seem to recall an Ultra message which says that II./Jg 3 left their aircraft behind for the use of III./Jg 76 (I may be confused on this point - will have to go back through my records to check). That might explain Rob's point about the groundcrew staying on at Athis/Plivot/Tours-sur-Marne.

The folk at Vraux have wartime photographs of the airfield. I shall meet them next week and see what they have. Also, I will visit the alleged site of Athis/Plivot/Tours-sur-Marne and, I hope, bore you with my holiday photos.

Chris