Observations on the victories of the Normandie-Niemen

[Courtois Laurent]

Hello everyone,

I am currently working on an atlas of Normandy-Niemen with one to three monthly maps and more than a thousand toponyms.
The maps show the evolution of the front line, the positions of the German and Soviet units, the aerial victories of the French pilots and the location of the crashes of the French pilots.

Each toponym cited in a French or Russian report is localized and reported in a glossary, with its German, Russian and French name, its current name and its GPS coordinates.

This work is the basis for carrying out all historical studies on Normandy-Niemen. It should be noted that some "specialist" of the subject always spells Stallupönen: Chtalloupienen....

To locate the French victories on the maps, I had to go back to the Russian archives. Indeed, it was the Russians who homologated the French victories from the reports transmitted by the political commissars of the regiment.

This is where the problems start. For example for the famous month of October 1944, one victory out of 5 underwent a modification between 1944 and 1946.

In French we use the expression "Mic-Mac" (Secret and complicated arrangements). The overall number of victories remains the number granted by the Soviets, but victories are grouped into "shared victories" to create new individual victories. Victories pass from one pilot to another, from one day to another.

For example the 3 victories canceled on October 17, 1944 at Captain Cuffaut are not lost for everyone, they are distributed to the squadron leaders.

Another example, on October 20, Midshipman Penverne shot down an FW 190 which was confirmed the next day. The official list of NN victories gives him an Me-109 the next day...
So for Roger Penverne's third victory, the official documents do not give the right day, nor the right type of plane, nor the right place.

Moreover, it is the locations of the victories that are the most altered. To draw up the maps, I took the reports from the troops on the ground, so I have a daily representation of the front line.
This allows problematic locations to be updated. For example ; still on October 17, the French pilots claim 5 Hs 129, beyond the blatant overclaiming (the 13/SG9 loses only 2 planes during the month), two of them would have been shot down south of Gumbinnen. But the report of the 303 IAD indicates that the pursuit was beyond the front line because of too much flak. the front line was that day east of Stallupönen, 30 km from Gumbinnen...

In a way, the locations provided by the Russian archives are more in line with the reality on the ground than the official French ones.

If members are interested, I can provide day-to-day details and we can ask our "Luftwaffe" colleagues if the corrections allow new cross-checks with the German archives.

Laurent COURTOIS