One Loss at Eastern Front Werknummer 10438

[Charles Bavarois]

Jens,

among the losses reported in January 1943 from III./JG 54 are at least three aircraft with blue tactical codes which is very unusal. To my knowledge on the Ostfront blue serials were not in use prior to 1945 (with the exception of those mentioned above) and III./JG 54 certainly had the usual Black/White/Yellow set of colors in 1942/43.

This is a hint, that the a/c were not part of the outfit of III./JG 54 any more (in spite of some of these a/c were damaged when serving with this Gruppe in 1942). III./JG 54 was scheduled to leave for the Westfront late 1942 in exchange for I/JG 26. The departure was delayed untill mid February 1943, when the Gruppe arrived in the West with newly delivered Bf 109 G-4s. Perhaps the Gruppe had handed over their old a/c in Dezember 1942 to another Gruppe or a feldluftpark in preparation for their relocation and was forced to use them in January 1943 due to their delayed departure. Officially the birds were not in the inventory of III./JG 54 and so they do not show in the "Flugzeugbewegungslisten" (nevertheless the Quartiermeistermeldungen and NVM were filed). A theory only, but it would explain the gap in the Bewegungsmeldungen.

BTW: NVM is 15.1. 43 which is backed up by a report from ground-forces.

Carl