Using Ultra to research the Luftwaffe

[lpunktlpunkt]

Thank you guys!
This is very helpful.

Nick, I assume you would not find the file among your scans that mentions Galland or Mölders by name?

[Nick Beale]

Originally Posted by lpunktlpunkt

Thank you guys!
This is very helpful.

Nick, I assume you would not find the file among your scans that mentions Galland or Mölders by name?

I remember that somewhere in the almost 4,000 pages I have from 1945 there was a mention of Galland's replacement as General der Jagdflieger and that in one message JV 44 was called "Jagdverband Galland". Mölders death came long before the period where my main research is concentrated, so the only mention I think I ever saw was of "JG Mölders" for JG 51 but I can't remember when that was. Unfortunately (from your point of view at least) I am much more interested in operations than in famous pilots.

[lpunktlpunkt]

I just went through my documents and the list of HW5 files. I would need scans of the HW5 files with the following serial numbers:

1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 20, 21, 22, 23, 28, 35, 36, 44, 45, 62, 63, 66, 67, 73, 75, 76, 77, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 90, 91, 92, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 102, 103, 104, 105, 121, 122, 128, 129, 133, 134, 220, 221, 222, 223, 276, 277, 278, 328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 338, 339, 340, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 368, 369, 370, 372, 373, 377, 378, 398, 399, 400, 436, 437, 456, 459, 460, 472, 514, 541, 570, 571, 576, 577, 578, 608, 613, 670, 671

In case you already have scans of some of them, would you be willing to share your scans of those files? This would help a lot with my research and I would be able to see how many of the remaining files I would have to scan myself. If I make additional scans, I would of course share them with this forum.

[Nick Beale]

Originally Posted by lpunktlpunkt

I just went through my documents and the list of HW5 files. I would need scans of the HW5 files with the following serial numbers

I think you misunderstood my earlier post. I can possibly help with individual messages if you can give me their serial numbers, not whole files.

By my count you want 104 files. If you worked Tuesday–Saturday at the National Archives (the days they are open) and did nothing but take photos of every page all day, you might get through that much in two or three weeks. After that you would have perhaps 450,000 images to read through for information you wanted and I cannot estimate how long that might take you. The alternative would be to spend much longer at the Archives, reading each page and only photographing messages directly relevant to your project. In choosing a subject spanning almost the entire war, you are facing an immense amount of work and even then the items referring to awards of medals would probably be much less than 1% of the total.

I am sorry if this is disappointing but I do not want to become, in effect, someone else's research assistant or to give away many years of work.

To offer some perspective, I have been researching at the National Archives since 1985, I started on DEFE3 ULTRA in 1989 and on the HW5 files in 2005. I usually spend 3–4 days each year there. This has been my hobby, undertaken in my free time (holidays, weekends) at my expense (travel, meals, hotels) for my pleasure and interest; the material I have gathered has been for my own projects, some complete, some in progress and others not yet started. I share a lot of the results freely through my website (maybe 300,000 words so far) and occasionally in answer to questions on this forum but I do not give away material in bulk.

[Andrew Arthy]

Hi,

Just stumbled across the attached in HW 5/35, mentioning Werner Mölders in October 1941, and remembered this thread.

Cheers,
Andrew A.
Air War Publications - www.airwarpublications.com

[AndreasB]

That does look familiar

All the best

Andreas

[Bruce Dennis]

From CX/MSS/2478/T5
a/c on charge Jj105 24/April/1943

FW190 A-3 werk no. 2232, (manufactured 1942) DP+MK
FW190 A-3 2233 (1942) DP+ML
FW190 A-2 5337 (1941) CN+GF
FW190 A-3 5378 (1942) CN+GL
FW190 A-2 5397 (1942) CI+UH

"No ME109 available" [use of 'ME' in English translation]

Bruce

[oquaig]

Hi everyone,

Dumb question : When were the HW 5 files and the Y intercepts first made available to researchers and the public ?

Thanks in advance
oquaig

[Steve Coates]

HW5 was made accessible in 1996. If you look at any particular file reference using Discovery, it will provide the date the record was 'opened'.

[Laurent Rizzotti]

It seems to me that some searchers were allowed to see Ultra files before that. In the 1980s I read a book (that is still in my parents house) with a part about Ultra and the Coventry raid.

I know that at least in France "recognized" searchers can be allowed to see archive documents with no public access allowed.