Seeking photos of Ju88A-1 shot down in the Firth of Forth on 16.10.39

[Larry Hickey]

Hello,

As a follow up to Peter Cornwell's posting of the salvage photo of the Ju88A-1 shot down during the I./KG30 attack against shipping in the Firth of Forth on October 16, 1939, has anyone located any intelligence reports resulting from the recovery of this aircraft? Assuming that it was recovered soon after it was shot down, this would have been the first substantial remains of a Ju88 recovered by the British, and presumably would have been the subject of detailed inspection and additional photography.

1) For captioning the photo that Peter shows above, does anyone know when the a/c was actually recovered from the sea? It is possible that this was not close to the time it was actually shot down.

2) Has anyone located in British historical files the intelligence reports based upon the recovery of this a/c, hopefully including additional photos of it's markings? These reports might well have included the W.Nr. of the a/c, and close-up photos of the shield emblem visible on the starboard nose.

3) Does anyone know if either in 1939 or since any effort has been made to locate and salvage the remains of the Ju88A-1 of Hptm. Pohle, the Gr Kdr, "ditched in the sea off Crail" during the same action? It reportedly carried the code 4D+AK. This may lie in very deep water.

Peter has now updated the info on this loss as follows:

"October 16, 1939: 1./KG30 Junkers Ju 88A-1. Shot down by Spitfires of ‘B’ Flight No.603 Squadron (F/L P. Gifford, F/O K. MacDonald, and F/O C. Robertson) and crashed in sea 4 miles north of Port Seton following attack on HMS Southampton in the Firth of Forth 2.55 p.m. Also engaged by elements of Yellow Section of No.602 Squadron. FF Oberlt Siegmund Storp (Staffelkapitän), BO Oberfw Hugo Köhnke, and BF Oberfw Hans-Georg Hielscher all captured slightly injured - rescued by trawler Dayspring, BS Obergefr Friedrich Krämer missing. Aircraft 4D+DH 100% write-off."

Thanx for any assistance,

[Andy Saunders]

I had contact with Pohle many years ago after acquiring an original sepia toned print of the Ju 88. Although I no longer have it I think the inscription on the back was something to the effect of "The first enemy aircraft aircraft downed over Britain" and, I think, a date stamp of something like 20 October. Those clues led me to think it was Pohle's a/c and his letter to me is reproduced bottom right of page 39 of Blitz Then & Now (Vol 1), but when I read his letter (and as Peter Cornwell has pointed out) the intact canopy rather indicated otherwise - and Storp seems likely I suppose.

[Larry Hickey]

Andy,

Thanx for your comments. If your memory of the date stamp is correct, this would indicate that Storp's a/c was salvaged from the water within a few days of the crash. This suggests that the wreckage would have received careful study by the British, which should mean additional photos and records exist from the study of this a/c. What happened to those records? Has anyone discovered them in the NA or elsewhere?

Can anyone confirm this?

Regards,

[edNorth]

Hi all,

Here come my two pennies on the Ju 88 photo. First I may point out II/KG 30 emblem. This Group was activated at Barth on 01.12.1939 but only began operations in March 1940 (because of weather). This rules out 16. October 1939 crash in my mind.

Possible harbour or harbour cranes. No luck on cranes in Scotland and elsewhere. Harbour? Only one I found matching in Britain is perhaps Whitby. A lot further south than Edinburgh and Port Seton, even futher south than "Cresswell Bay" [Druridge Bay, near Cresswell, North-Humberland] . Does harbour stucture in background in Ju 88 photo look similar to Whitby´s? Maybe one of Scotlands harbours has such pier and cranes, I do not know.

http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/226240

Then to II/KG 30 aircraft salvaged. Attached is detail of K-Report on Ju 88 aircraft, downed by AA fire, matching what I belive likely had intact canopy upon salvage: The 4D+AP (Yellow A) had three of its crew found still inside of it and lots of papers. Report does not state aircraft serial number.

Regards
ed

[Larry Hickey]

Ed,

Interesting theory which would explain the problem with the shield on the nose of the a/c that doesn't seem to fit either of the I./KG30 losses on Oct. 16, 1939, in the Firth of Forth. Besides the shield problem, it also has bothered me that this likely being a Fjord-type geography, where the crashes that day might well have been in very deep water, either of these plane wrecks might well have been very hard to reach by divers. It has also bothered me that there are no apparent records of this relatively intact a/c wreckage undergoing intense scrutiny by RAF Intel. Of course, a loss date of March 29, 1940, doesn't fit if Andy is correct about having once seen a photo with a date around the end of October, 1939, stamped on the back. I certainly think that it's worth asking now if this could be the March 29, 1940, loss undergoing salvage. Any more thoughts by anybody on this idea? Could Ed be onto something here?

"March 29, 1940: 6./KG30 Junkers Ju 88A-1. Shot down by naval AA fire and crashed into Cresswell Bay, off coast of Northumberland, 9.30 p.m. (Ff) Oberlt Rudolf Quadt (Staffelkapitän), (Beo) Fw Gustav Hartung, and (Bf) Uffz Andreas Wunderling killed, (Bs) Uffz Ernst Hesse missing. Aircraft 4D+AP 100% write-off.
The bodies of Oberlt Quadt, Fw Hartung, and Uffz Wunderling were recovered from the salvaged aircraft and buried at Chevington on April 9. The body of Uffz Hesse was later washed ashore on Lynemouth Beach and buried at Broomhill, East Chevington, on June 17."

If the photo posted by Peter Cornwell as part of this thread is the March 29, 1940, crash, where are the additional photos and documentation of the wreckage of that a/c after being salvaged? Surely the wreckage of that one should have received some serious attention by RAF Intel. Are we looking for records and info for the wrong a/c crash?

I'll be most interested to see what Peter C. and Andy S. think about this idea. In the meantime, I'm off to Dallas, TX for the weekend for a big family wedding (my nephew), leaving Peter C. to suck noxious gases from the corpses of dead cats. Yeeha!

Regards,

[Jim P.]

Love the notation "Very Secret" - as opposed to?

[edNorth]

"Ultra" decoding of German messages, was "Ultra-Secret" ;-)

[obdl3945]

Yuck... poor Peter C!

[edwest]

For what it's worth, I've contacted the RAF Museum for more information by e-mail. I should get an answer within 20 days. As I recall, Most Secret was the highest classification on documents other than Ultra.




Ed

[Larry Hickey]

Hello,

The EoE team investigation into the alleged photo of one of two Ju88s shot down in to the Firth of Forth on this 16.10.39 mission has now reached an unexpected conclusion. Ed North in his post in this thread suggested that the photo of a Ju88A being lifted by a salvage crane was not one of these aircraft, as has long been published, but, in fact could be 4D+AP which was lost with Oblt. Quadt, StaKap of 6./KG30 in Cresswell Bay, Northumberland, on March 29, 1940. That plane was known to have been salvaged. With help from Andy Saunders and Peter Cornwell, our EoE research team has concluded that Ed North is correct, and that this photo does show the 6 Staffel a/c being unloaded after salvage from Cresswell Bay shortly after the late-March crash, which was fatal to the crew. We don't know if the missing tail of this a/c was ever recovered. Peter has posted this photo above. He email about this photo: "It would be neat to identify the harbor where this salvaged Ju88 was photographed. Looks like a long breakwater in the background – Coquet ?"

I'm planning a color profile of this a/c representing a 6./KG30 Ju88A-1 for the Phoney War volume of the EoE book series. The only important thing lacking now is a W.Nr. for this a/c, which I'm convinced existed in some technical evaluation reports that would have been compiled at the time. Whether these reports still exist is unknown to our team. If anyone has discovered any technical reports on this aircraft, and hopefully any additional photography of it after salvage from the sea, I would very much appreciate hearing about it. We have all three K-Reports on the loss and recovery of this a/c from British Intelligence files, but we have no reports which might have been done as a result of a technical evaluation and study of this aircraft, which I believe was the first Ju88 to crash and be recovered off England, as opposed to the earlier losses on or adjacent to Scottish soil.

Now, back to the original problem, which is to locate and identify sufficient information to create a color profile for at least one of the three Ju88s that crashed while conducting operations near Scapa Flow and the Firth of Forth in mid-October, 1939. We know that the three Ju88s lost on October 16 and 17, 1939 were coded 4D+DH, 4D+AK and 4D+EK, and several prisoners were taken, including members from all three crews. Other than the K-Reports, which we have on all three, is anyone aware of any post war interviews or accounts published from any of the the air crewmen that were taken prisoner from these incidents? I think it very likely that all of the a/c that crashed had the early 4-bladed props. It also appears quite possible that at least the two aircraft that ditched in the Firth of Forth on 16 October were later salvaged from the sea and examined by British intelligence, which might give us W.Nrs. Does anyone have any evidence of that happening? Pohle's interrogation report indicates that he expected that that would happen.


These three losses on those two days, plus another crash-landing at Westerland on the 16th, we have recorded as:

"16. October 1939:

Stab I./KG30 Junkers Ju 88A-1. One engine damaged by AA fire and cockpit hood lost during attack on HMS Southampton in the Firth of Forth. Finally engaged by Blue Section of No. 602 Squadron (S/L A. McKellar, F/Lt G. Pinkerton, and F/O P. A. Webb) and ditched in the sea off Crail 2.45 p.m. (Ff) Hptmn Helmut Pohle (Gruppenkommandeur) rescued - badly injured face in landing. (Bs) Gefr August Schleicher rescued badly wounded - later died, (Bf) Uffz Kurt Naake killed, and (Beo) Fw Werner Weise missing. Aircraft 4D+AK 100% loss.

1./KG30 Junkers Ju 88A-1. Shot down by Green Section of No. 603 Squadron (S/L A. D. Farquhar, F/Lt A. V. R. Johnstone, and F/O P. J. Ferguson) and crashed in the sea 4 miles north of Port Seton following attack on HMS Southampton in the Firth of Forth 2.50 p.m. (Ff) Oberlt Siegmund Storp, (Beo) Oberfw Hugo Köhnke and (Bf) Oberfw Hans Hielscher all captured slightly injured, rescued by trawler Dayspring. (Bs) Obergefr Friedrich Krämer missing. Aircraft 4D+DH 100% loss.

1./KG30 Junkers Ju 88A-1. Shot down by Spitfires of ‘B’ Flight No.603 Squadron (F/L P. Gifford, F/O K. MacDonald, and F/O C. Robertson) and crashed in sea 4 miles north of Port Seton following attack on HMS Southampton in the Firth of Forth 2.55 p.m. Also engaged by elements of Yellow Section of No.602 Squadron. FF Oberlt Siegmund Storp (Staffelkapitän), BO Oberfw Hugo Köhnke, and BF Oberfw Hans-Georg Hielscher all captured slightly injured - rescued by trawler Dayspring, BS Obergefr Friedrich Krämer missing. Aircraft 4D+DH 100% write-off.

17 October 1939:

2./KG30 Junkers Ju88A-1. Suffered direct hit by AA fire during attack on British Fleet in Scapa Flow and exploded in Pegal Burn on the island of Hoy in the Orkney Islands 11.15 a.m. (Ff) Oberlt Walter Flämig, (Beo) Gefr Hans Attenberger, and (Bs) Uffz Rudi Faust killed. (Bf) Uffz Fritz Ambrosius baled out and captured badly wounded and burned. Aircraft 4D+EK 100% write-off.
Remains of this aircraft, the first to crash on mainland Great Britain, and three of its crew were scattered across an area of a quarter mile. They are buried at Lyness as Unknown Airmen."

I have Henry Buckton's book, "Birth of the Few," which recreates the October 16th mission in considerable detail. Can it be relied upon for accuracy? No photos from the German side, however. Pohle and Storp, down on the 16th, provided only general information of their experiences on the mission during their subsequent interrogations. Uffz Ambrosius was the subject of a 19-page intel debriefing report, so his experiences on the 17 October mission are very well covered,

I'd like to do a color profile of Pohle's a/c, and for that I still need a photo of a 2./KG30 Ju88A-1 from the fall of 1939 showing a full a/c code on the fuselage and/or underwing and top wing coding styles. Can anyone point me towards any appropriate photography, preferably showing a plane with 4-bladed prop? I already have the photo of the 2 Staffel Ju88 with the destroyed nose from a ground collision at Westerland on Oct 21st, but this shows only the cockpit area and front of the a/c.

Thanks to all of you for your help so far.

Regards,