Knoke's claim, Nov 6 1942

[Jochen Prien]

Gentlemen,

first of all I want to point out that from the impression I got from Heinz Knoke whom I met a number of times and with whom I had many telephone conversations with respect to the unit history of JG 1 and 11 that I worked on during the late 'eighties, he was definitely no boaster and - as far as this can be judged in retrospect - certainly not intent on overclaiming. He certainly was a lively and extremely interested individual who in his late years attended university to hear - if I remeber that right - philosophy and or sociology. But he did not give the impression that he could have laid an unjustified claim on purpose.

His book was written in the early fifties based only on his memory, his Feindflugbuch ( flight log for sorties only ) and the scarce notes he still had. There are certainly a number of twisted dates and also outright errors, many of which we have pointed at in our history of JG 1 and 11 with the expressive agreement of Heinz Knoke, but that doesn't change the fact that the book conveys a very personal yet quite representative picture of the German dayfighters in the home defense.

Now, to his claim of November 6th, 1942: In his book he identified his opponent as a Mosquito, based on the entry in his flight log where it said that he shot down a De Havilland Mosquito in qbi conditions ( very bad visibility ) 70 km north of Borkum. In a claim report of I./JG 1 it said that the opponent was in fact a Blenheim, shot down at 14.26 hrs 20 km north of Wangerooge. And, what is important: It was not confirmed, although it may be the one RAF roundel that appeared on his a/c as his first claim in early 1943.

So, whatever British a/c he fired at on that cloudy Novemberday, he was not rewarded with the confirmation of an unwarranted aerial victory.

Hope this helps.

Regards

Jochen Prien