Maj. W. Hoffman NJG5 meets Lancaster pilot he shot down in hospital 1945.

[RodM]

Yes, it's a shame that Kevin never recalled even a first name of the airman.

I have looked at NJG losses from around that time but cannot find a match that (a) was likely in the same hospital, (b) suffered burns, and (c) was captured at the hospital when the Americans arrived.

I don't think Kevin encountered the German airman straight away (i.e. on or around 17 March), the first meeting likely occurred several days later. From Kevin's Liberation Questionnaire, the Americans arrived on 18 April 1945.

Of the airmen I mentioned, I don't know all the details about Ofw. Rottmann. He likely landed by parachute in Nürnberg and he never rejoined the crew. He suffered a broken ankle. No serious burns are mentioned.

The airman Kevin encountered was not Fw. Ferdinand Modl.

Modl - an Austrian - wrote an account of what happened to him, while in Salzburg in September 1945, one month after he was discharged from the Wehrmacht by the US occupation forces in Salzburg. His injuries were not debilitating because he worked as a truck driver for the US occupation forces in Austria after the war.

Modl's account is clear on where he was hospitalized (Bamberg, mentioned more than once) and the nature of his injuries. He doesn't mention encountering any enemy airman, although he mentions visits by his crew and friends and family. Modl's typewritten account ends at 10.4.45, where he mentions receiving good food and getting a good nights' sleep.