3.(F)/22 loss in February 1942

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Hello,

The Luftwaffe loss list (Gen.Qu.6.Abt) for 4 February 1942 has for entry 14 the Do 17 WNr 3597 of 3.(F)/22 damaged at 15% by Flak fire during an operational sortie to Staraja-Russa. Two crew, Lt Franz Mörkförster (observer) and Uffz Kurt Martin (radio), were initially reported as wounded. The status of Mörkförster was changed (if I read correctly on 24 February 1942) to dead.

There is no Mörkförster listed in Volksbund or in the death cards at fold3, but among the latter there is a Lt Franz Mürköster of 3.(F)/22 who was wounded by Flak shrapnel during a mission (Feindflug) SE of Cholm on 1 February 1942 and who died in an hospital (I read Armeelazaret) at Dno on 5 February. He was born on 16 March 1907 in Arnsberg.
See https://www.fold3.com/image/699152426

The dead list for Arnberg confirmed the name, a Franz Mürköster from here died during the war.
See https://www.arnsberg.de/archiv/archi...otenzettel.pdf

So I guess the loss list had a false name. Can someone confirm the name from the NVM, please ?

By the way the name Mörkförster can also be found in the Lufwaffe officers carreer files by Henry L. deZeng IV and Douglas G. Stankey, probably coming direct from the loss files (no other data than the loss data for this entry).

[Chris Goss]

I have the loss as 1 Feb 42 and the crew Lt Franz Mürköster (B) and Uffz Kurt Martin (BF) wounded but the former then died of his wounds at Dno

[Matti Salonen]

The name is in the NVM Mürköster but in the EM-Verzeichnis Mührköster. I don't know for sure, which one is correct.

Matti

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Thanks to both of you. Mürköster is probably the right one, being used in the death card, the NVM and the dead list from Arnsberg.

This Mürköster is not in the Volksbund database. I tried various combinations (with ue or u replacing ü, same with o, and with Mührköster) and found nothing, only Mürköster returns some entries (six in all, all for WWII).

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Ah, maybe not so simple. There is one Franz Mürköster on the Arnsberg Totenzettel, and I found two, our man on 1-5 February 1942 and another who died on 1 August 1941 with 8./IR 60 (mot.), 16.ID (mot.).

[Matti Salonen]

Laurent, please don't be so sure. You have to remember that those death cards were made copying data from the NVMs and apparently the EM-Verzeichnis was not checked. There are hundreds of cases when name, date of birth or EM-number are different in the NVM and EM-Verzeichnis.

Matti

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Originally Posted by Matti Salonen

Laurent, please don't be so sure. You have to remember that those death cards were made copying data from the NVMs and apparently the EM-Verzeichnis was not checked. There are hundreds of cases when name, date of birth or EM-number are different in the NVM and EM-Verzeichnis.

Matti

Yes, actually I was counting NVM-death card as one source and the Tottenzetell as another, but the second is no more accurate, so back to start point.

For sure, Mörkförster is false, and I will list the casualty name as "Franz Mürköster (or Mührköster)". Mürköster seems far more common than Mührköster. On the other hand, with the extra h, this is the same number of letters as in Mörkförster. I did another round of searches just in case by replacing the k by f in Mürköster/Mührköster and testing various possibilies in Volksbund, but still no success.

Still the fact that this casualty was not found on the Volksbund is unusual for the circumstances of the dead (dying of wound in Russia in 1942), so maybe we still don't have the right name at all.