Heinz Marquardt and Kurt Tanzer

[knusel]

Good afternoon Johannes,

your endeavours to clarify obscure issues are praiseworthy and well-balanced.
Do you think we will ever find the missing dates of the kills of Heinz Marquardt ?

Athe best to you,

Michael

[ju55dk]

Can be found i Freiburg:

PERS 6/53009
Marquardt, Fritz Heinz
Bestandsbezeichnung
Personalunterlagen von Angehörigen der Reichswehr und Wehrmacht
Geburtsdatum
18.12.1916
Amtsbezeichnung/Dienstgrad
Oberleutnant
Unterlagenart
Personalakte

PERS 6/221378
Tanzer, Kurt
Bestandsbezeichnung
Personalunterlagen von Angehörigen der Reichswehr und Wehrmacht
Geburtsdatum
1.11.1920
Amtsbezeichnung/Dienstgrad
Leutnant
Unterlagenart
Personalakte

Junker

[Johannes]

Hi Michael

Thank you for the praise, much appreciated.

Marquardt stated to David Williams that when he was shot down on 1st May 1945 his flugbuch was with him, and went down into a river with his aircraft.

Post mikrofilms the only concrete evidence of Marquardt claims is a flugbuch of another pilot in his Staffel. There are about four(by memory) that he was witness to, and bless him he even numbered them, to give this a reliability text he also witnessed some of Marquardt's 1944 claims covered by the mikrofilms, and they are a complete match 100%, he is also the guy who mentions Tanzer.

KBT papers cover 1945, usually only high scoring pilots are mentioned by name, Marrquardt would qualify, but those I have only cover sectors of the front where Marquardt was not. But it's quite possible that KBT papers will come to light and mention him....so fingers crossed.

Point is that we uncover more evidence as time goes on.

Keep well

Johannes

[knusel]

Good morning Gentlemen,

I wonder if it ever will be possible to find out exactly how many of Heinz Marquardt's kills were scored in the Bf109.
I assume kills #1-97 were scored in the Bf109G, #99-109 in the Fw190A and #110-121 in the Fw190D.
But what about #98 ?

Have a nice Saturday,

Michael

[knusel]

Originally Posted by ju55dk

Can be found i Freiburg:

...

PERS 6/221378
Tanzer, Kurt
Bestandsbezeichnung
Personalunterlagen von Angehörigen der Reichswehr und Wehrmacht
Geburtsdatum
1.11.1920
Amtsbezeichnung/Dienstgrad
Leutnant
Unterlagenart
Personalakte

Junker

Good evening Junker,

does the file make a statement about his final score ?

Cheers,

Michael

[Steve Coates]

That would be highly unlikely.

[knusel]

Kurt Tanzer is said to have served with units called Jagdfliegerführer 6 and Jagdfliegerführer Ostpreussen between June 1944 and February 1945. Is it known if he flew the Bf109 or the Fw190 there ?

[Johannes]

Hi

I think Ostpreussen was under the direct command of JG51 i.e part of it.. Where ever he served after being wounded in May 1943(just in the hand) the mikrofilms should have picked-up any claims. As stated before there is evidence he later flew with IV./JG51, this evidence being he was mentioned in a IV./JG51 pilots flugbuch(Arensmeyer). I would say he was likely to have claims a few more Russian aircraft. It looks like perhaps he got 43, and a mis-type made it 143

Actually thinking about it JG51 in the East made very, very few claims over U.S aircraft, and the amount quoted for Tanzer is more than everybody else put together............it just cannot be, no matter how specific the numbers are !

Kind Regards

Johannes

[Andrew Arthy]

Originally Posted by knusel

Kurt Tanzer is said to have served with units called Jagdfliegerführer 6 and Jagdfliegerführer Ostpreussen between June 1944 and February 1945. Is it known if he flew the Bf109 or the Fw190 there ?

Hi,

These were higher headquarter units. See:

- https://ww2.dk/air/hq/ostpr.htm
- https://ww2.dk/air/hq/jafu6.htm

They were directing operations rather than flying them. A rough translation from Günther Josten's diary on 24 June 1944:

"I spend the night with Oberst Nordmann's Stab. I stay with Lt. Tanzer and get an insight into the work of the Jafü."

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

[Johannes]

Thanks Andrew

This does tie Tanzer to a place, and unit.

With regards to Marquardt Bernd Barbas has released online a biography about him.

Is strange that Tanzer takes so long to return to combat. As I remember he was shot in a hand, lost a lot of blood. But you would think that he would be returned to combat after a short break. Perhaps he had other wounds also. In 1945 seems that everybody came crawling out of the woodwork back to combat.

The absolute shame is that we didn't start the process of investigating Tanzer's total whilst some of his konrads were still alive.

Tanzer would be perfect to be set-up in a "fake information" game i.e a cheap Ritterkreuz, then died so early on, before real interest was being shown in the great aces. Maybe someday a flugbuch will surface !

Kind Regards

Johannes