Severe Overclaimers Vs. Reliable Claimers List

[Laurent Rizzotti]

I have ever been doubtful about pilots claiming score of kills in some minutes. The probability of overclaiming is here in my own opinion more important, because I think most of these pilots just hit an enemy aircraft and immediatly chased another, thinking the first to be destroyed.

If you watch the record of Lipfert, he scored 3 victories in a sortie on 2 Dec 1943 (in 16 minutes), maybe 3 in the same sortie on 7 May 44 (one at 8h49, two at 9h40-45, may also have been two sorties) and 3 in one sortie on 19 July 44 (in 5 minutes). That is only 2 and maybe 3 triples on 203 claims (all known).

Now consider Rudorffer. He claimed 3 victories in one sortie on 7 Sep 40 (in 13 minutes), 3 on 19 Aug 41 (in 16 minutes), 3 on 21 Sep 1941 (in 15 minutes), 8 on 9 Feb 43 (in 22 minutes), 6 or 7 on 15 Feb 43 (6 in 15 minutes, one more 40 minutes later), 3 in the morning of 24 Aug 43 (in 7 minutes) and 5 in the afternoon (in 4 minutes), 5 on 14 Sep 43 (in 5 minutes), 7 on 11 Oct 43 (in 7 minutes), 13 on 6 Nov 11 (in 19 minutes), 6 on 7 Apr 44 (in 16 minutes), 3 on 28 Apr 44 (in 3 minutes), 5 on 3 July 44 (in 4 minutes), 6 on 26 Jul 44 (in 28 minutes), 3 on 27 Jul 44 (in 6 minutes), 3 on 17 Aug 43 (in 11 minutes), 5 on 25 Aug 43 (in 11 minutes), 4 on 6 Sep 44 (in 5 minutes), 3 on 17 Sep 44 (in 6 minutes), 6 on 25 Sep 44 (in 14 minutes), 7 on 10 Oct 44 (in 18 minutes), 4 on 22 Oct 44 (in 5 minutes) and 9 on 28 Oct 44 (in 10 minutes). I know 211 of his 224 claims, and of these 211, 120 or 121 were claimed in sorties where he made more than 3 claims.

By the way it proves nothing, Marseille has been studied in depth and was not an heavy overclaimer but claimed 82 of his 158 victories in sorties with 3 kills of more.

But without more data I will thrust more a pilot who claimed more often a small number of victories.

[Rob Romero]

Laurence -nice to hear from you again -did you notice I used your proportional method to estimate Oskar Romm’s (EVV) at 73? ;-)

Severe Overclaimers Vs. Reliable Claimers List

-Update Helmut Lipfert (203) & Heinrich Setz (138)

Recently, I attempted to initiate a database of Historically Verifiable Victories (VV). Although some headway (especially with WWI German Aces) has been attained, the result, has not yet become what one might have hoped. Perhaps a more realistic approach would be to garner a sense of which aces were reliable versus exaggerated claimants. Admittedly, as with Historically Verifiable Victories Thread, the this would be an IMPERFECT and CONTROVERSIAL undertaking, however, eventually, and with much vetting, this avenue might garner some historical insight. To reduce my workload, I will keep this list EXCLUSIVE of the more concrete results obtained in the Historically Verifiable Victories (VV) Thread.

Alleged Heavy Overclaimers
352 Erich Hartmann -based on ‘research’ of Dimitri Khazanov
258 Walter Nowotny -as per Dimitri Khazanov
224 Erich Rudorffer Afrika “Rudorffer's serious overclaims over the eastern front” -Falsified Claims in Afrika? ~120 of 211 documented victories were claimed in sorties where he claimed 3 or more victories.
173 Emil Lang
129 Walter Dahl -less than 100 credits according to J-Y Lorant
127 Walter Oesau
112 Kurt Bühlingen
99 Heinrich Bartels
94 Rudolf Muller
93 Sigfried Schnell
56 Helmut Wick -1/5? claims on 6 Nov 40 are VV.
37 Thomas McGwire (Harry Brown (7) personally related that McGwire scrambled, parachuted over base & claimed 3 kills he could not possibly have made!)
33 Erwin Sawallisch (Allegedly caught falsifying combats with schwarm in Afrika –may have subsequently killed himself -Source Hans Ring/Chris Shores)

JG2 in Afrika, JG5 , JG54 are some of the Luftwaffe Units Alleged to have had a licentious attitude over overclaiming.

Alleged Reliable Claimers
(Be Mindful that few pilots even come near to 100% reliablility in their claims)
221 Heinz Bär (Some overclaims)
203 Helmut Lipfert -his combat memoirs are a MUST READ!
158 Hans-Joachim Marseille -that he often scored multiple victories in a matter of minutes places the magnitude of his accomplishments in an even greater light.
138 Heinrich Setz -good sorties/kills ratio as well
103 Adolf Galland (Don Caldwell alleges that Galland deliberately overclaimed on at least one occaision)
102 Egon Mayer
101 Josef Priller (Kept meticulous record of combats apparently researched and largely verified by Johnny Johnson (38 )
92 Oskar Romm -On the basis of 5 Feb 44 mission in which he claimed 1 Soviet Yak & 5 Bostons -Yak shot down & 6/8 Bostons claimed by JG51 were shot down. On the basis of this single mission I will assign him a VERY PRELIMINARY claim reliability ESTIMATE of 79.2% and Estimate his Verified Victories @ (79EVV)
35 Bruno Stolle

[Nokose]

Rob, After reading the Russian story of the 05Feb44 it sounds like Romm might have gotten at least 4 of the Bostons but without seeing Romm, Josten and Stroinigg's reports who knows. His 09:04 attack was probably the one fended off by the gunners of Rud's Boston who claimed a shoot down of a FW190. Hans Stroingg's attack hit when they had used up all there ammo. Don't know how that ratio would fit.

[Rob Romero]

Enjoy,

Rob Romero

[Klaus Schiffler]

The list contains no names of Soviet, Japanese or Italian aces who were notorious in their overclaiming.

[Rob Romero]

1) Keep in mind that my primary interest is Luftwaffe Aces.

2) The list is available for your edification, but it is also an invitation. If you have specific individuals/infomration in mind, please feel free to contribute.

[Rob Romero]

See Attatchment

-Rob Romero

[Mark R.]

I must admit to being intrigued by the GC II/5 war diary reference. The 31st Fighter Group, which apparently had "control" of all fighter aircraft at Telepte, recorded the following message dated 091450Z Feb 43 about the French squadron which it forwarded to XII Air Support Command: "Air Operation #5 - Nine P-40s of the Lafayette Escadrille led by Lt Tremolet, Up 1315, escorted four P-39s on recon mission. Eight P-40s down 1435, one a/c and pilot not yet returned. Pilots were Lt Tremolet, Lt Hebrard, Lt Boudier, S/Sgt Denaix (NYR), M/S Verrier, M/S Casenobe, M/S Graf, Bou Dabous [sic? Cannot figure that out - Borg?]. Four enemy aircraft dived on P-40s, followed by three others. P-40s at 5,000 feet, e/a at 8,000 ft. Lt Hebrard followed one FW-190 attacking a P-40, and was in turn followed by a FW-190 which overshot him and executed a climbing right turn. Lt Hebrard opened fire at this e/a at 125 yards, the FW-190 diving out of control, showing much white smoke and was seen to crash. The pilot did not bail out. Lt Hebrard claims 1 FW-190 destroyed. The balance of the e/a broke off and headed in the direction of Kairouan. One P-40 was found to be missing after the engagement, but circumstances are not known, the combat occurred between Djebel Hannekal and Djebel Chacerour. Report light flak near Sbikka. Our casualties one a/c and pilot NYR. Enemy casualties one FW-190. Weather broken scattered clouds at 5,000 feet, ceiling very high."

SECOND MESSAGE dated 091850Z Feb 1943 - "Reference todays report on Air Operation #5. S/Sgt Denaix reported NYR has returned 1745 hours. Slight foot wound. Will have PD claim on FW-190. Further report will follow."

Will have to admit the discrepancies are puzzling, but sometimes wartime documents are not updated. Seems that any link between a French P-40 squadron and a newly arrived USAAF Spitfire Group would be tenuous at best. But the only way the French could report to XIII Air Support Command would be through an American unit.

ONE ALIBI - Bou Dabous is near Cap Bon. I think the person typing up the report added the destination of the reconnaissance flight "to Bou Dabous" before typing in the last name of the French pilots. Then he got flustered and forgot to type in "to".

SECOND ALIBI - US report lists French pilots by abbreviation of US equivalent ranks: M/S = Master Sergeant and S/Sgt = Staff Sergeant.

[Andrew Arthy]

Hi Mark,

The French pilots involved were:

Lieutenant TREMOLET
Adjudant-chef CASENOBE
Lieutenant HEBRARD
Lieutenant BOUDIER
Sergent-chef BORG
Adjudant-chef MORET
Adjudant-chef GRAS
Adjudant-chef VERRIER
Sergent-chef DENAIX

Cheers,
Andrew A.

Air War Publications - www.airwarpublications.com

[Mark R.]

Andrew, I can see where the Americans spelled a couple of names wrong. I guess that can happen even if you are on the same airfield. Many thanks. I am orienting most of my current research on mission reports with unit histories as a backup. I have found the former more detailed, especially in the case of the 1st, 52d and 14th Fighter Groups. THe 31st is not so bad at times and the 33d is not very well documented in the former category. I am looking forward to June when I can head back to the National Archives to begin collecting material on the 12th AF bomber groups, photo recon, and the observation squadrons.

Sincerely,

Mark