Need help identifying BoB He111 with three stripes on the tail

[Dénes Bernád]

Originally Posted by Larry Hickey

Thanx to one of our EoE researchers, a new photo (to me) has surfaced showing the tail of a crashed He111 in a British salvage dump. It clearly has three vertical white or pink stripes on the rudder. This was a type of marking applied to rudders and upper outer wings of several LW bomber geschwader for the mass raids around 15 September 1940.

I have/have seen hundred if not thousands of photos of He 111s involved in BoB, but very-very few had stripes like these. Is the meaning of them understood? Was it some sort of quick air-to-air identification marking? Just curious...

[Larry Hickey]

Dénes,

I've made a detailed study of this, as has Gerhard Stemmer. There is no question that these were tactical formation markings used by the KG of some LF for the massive daylight raids planned and executed in mid-September 1940. IIRC first documented date is 11 September, but examples continue until well into October and even later until the markings were worn off or finally painted over. At least four He111s shot down on 15 September from both KG26 and KG53 have been documented. These markings are also known by units flying Do17s and Ju88s during the same period. The reason you haven't seen many photos of them is that they were used for such a short time, and not all units used them. Regarding just He111s, off the top of my head I don't remember seeing any examples of these markings on a/c of KG1, KG27 or KG55. If anyone knows of examples from these units, I'd certainly appreciate hearing about this.

Do you have any photos in your collection that show these markings?

[Dénes Bernád]

Originally Posted by Larry Hickey

Do you have any photos in your collection that show these markings?

Thank you, Larry, for the detailed explanation. Very interesting, indeed.
I didn't know Do 17s and Ju 88s also used the same style of marking. I have seen them only on He 111s.
I do have such photos in my collection, yes, but only a couple.
I need to look into my photo boxes during the week-end and return to you.

[Larry Hickey]

Dénes,

ANY photos of these markings are quite rare, so I'd be quite interested in seeing what you might have. Will be happy to share what I have with you. I've got a lot of profile packages to develop of LW a/c with these markings, and not near enough photos to presently document them all.

KR