Colourized photo of Me 262 WNr. 113368 at Innsbruck-Hötting

[Karoband]

Hello David,

To the best of my knowledge the original transcription of the JV44 inventory on 26 April 1945 can be found in David E. Brown, etal., Me 262 KG(J) and KG units in Czech Territory, (JaPo, 2010), p. 64, and also Messerschmitt Me 262 Production & Arado Ar 234 Final Operations, (JaPo, 2012), p. 48.

To make so many mistakes, it is likely that the transcriber was doing his best to make out numerals from a blurred copy, and it would be unwise to assume that all his errors were limited only to those involving werknummern that fell outside of the known series listings. Therefore, I would suggest that the transcriber could have mistaken a blurred '8' for a '5'; when he wrote '113365'.

In Dan O'Connell's opus, "113368" is listed as "Me 262 A-1a. Found at Innsbruck-Hötting, Austria, by US troops. Possibly delivered to JV44. [afo]" "[afo]" is also the same source of information for his entry on "113369": "J. Richard Smith and Eddie Creek, correspondence September 2000."

From Smith & Creek, Me 262 Volume 4, (Classic, 2000), p. 737 and O'Connell, p. 219 for Wednesday, 2 May 1945: "A total of 22 Me 262s from JV44 were flown to Innsbruck but seven crashed on landing …" This suggests that fifteen intact Me 262s should have been found at Hötting.

Best regards,

Jim