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  #41  
Old 13th October 2010, 03:01
Jan vd Heuvel Jan vd Heuvel is offline
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Re: The Eagles Over Europe (EOE) Project

Hi Larry,

this shows once more what a good autheur you are.

You really understand that it is good to describe which events took place before the events you are going to describe took place and maybe (probably) will have influenced the outcome of those events.

I have seen some of your books in the EOP projects and they are great !!

So I have every conficence that the EOE books will be the ultimate books upon that subject.

No thanks for the help I could offer you. Just glad I could be of some help.

And as you know, I will be supporting your projects.

Kind Regards,
Jan


PS.

And for the owner of this board, I was put off by posting more replies because of the restrictions in posting more photo's.

Maybe you should give members a bit more diskspace to post unpublished photo's.
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  #42  
Old 13th January 2011, 06:57
Larry Hickey Larry Hickey is offline
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Re: The Eagles Over Europe (EOE) Project

Alex,

I think that you posted this on the wrong thread. As my posting says, the EOE project doesn't directly deal with air combat later than 31.12.40.

Regards,
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  #43  
Old 8th March 2012, 00:32
Larry Hickey Larry Hickey is offline
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Re: The Eagles Over Europe (EOE) Project

Hello all,

Today we hit a tremendous milestone in the Eagles over Europe project. Our main German-language translator has now completed from the Heinrich Weiss manuscripts the entire Western Campaign and the Battle of Britain. This is about 4000 single-spaced typewritten pages of text, totaling nearly 2,000,000 words, translated from German into English. This is a day-by-day account of all German air operations in Europe in the west and surrounding waters during the period from 10 May through 31 October 1940. We're also now nearly completed with translations into English of German text sources relating to the German side of the Polish Campaign, probably another thousand pages. This latter material isn't included in the Weiss manuscript since that manuscript focuses on the war in the west from 1 Sept. 1939 through July 1941.

Over the next few days, I hope to write a comprehensive update on the EoE project, as many other things have been happening, which I will post here and on the LEMB board.

Regards,
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  #44  
Old 8th March 2012, 17:14
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Marcel Hogenhuis Marcel Hogenhuis is offline
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Re: The Eagles Over Europe (EOE) Project

Hello Larry,

Just curious about Heinrich Weiss: who was he and is his information somehow traceable, read: specified to primary sources ?

What puzzles me the most (hail the ignorants) is that I know hardly any publications of European air war historians referring to this collection.

I am not expressing doubts about something I have no knowledge of but just asking about the backgrounds of this collection and/or its former owner to get a better picture.

(and if you should come around He219 stuff for my He219 project, don't hesitate to contact me )

Really looking forward to the EOE publications ! All the best from Venlo,

Marcel Hogenhuis
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  #45  
Old 8th March 2012, 21:24
Larry Hickey Larry Hickey is offline
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Re: The Eagles Over Europe (EOE) Project

Marcel,

I think that I wrote about the Heinrich Weiss manuscripts in some of my earlier posts on this thread. He is a German researcher/historian who spent many decades of his life before his death about ten years or so ago, researching in great detail the history of the German side of the European air war in the west from 1.9.39 through July, 1941. This coincides closely with the period of the EoE project, which ends 31.12.40. Heinrich attempted to pull together every reference source in the German archives (BA) and elsewhere, then acquire related Allied records, and match them to that of the Germans in a day to day account for this entire period. Some of his research has been published in books with Brian Cull "Twelve Days in May," and the book "Fledgling Eagles" by Chris Shores, et. al. In both he's listed as a co-author. There are two manuscripts, his original one which covers from the beginning of the war until about 10 July 1940. This deals with all operations on all European fronts in the west, and a second one where he started over with what he calls the "Coastal War." This one covers from the beginning of the war through July 1941, and covers all operations in Europe as well as all operations over land near the coast, including all daily recon missions around the periphery of Europe. He considered the Battle of Britain part of the Coastal War, so that is covered in great detail in the second manuscript. A typical day during the BoB runs from about 15 single-spaced typewritten pages for some days in July, to about 75-80 for some of the peak days during August and September. Night fighter ops, RAF attacks on the continent, Coastal Command Ops are all addressed, including target damage on the ground, German interceptions of incoming attacks and air losses on both sides. It is very, very comprehensive, but there is very little material in the form of personal narratives, or even mentioning the names of German pilots, other than the losses, which he addresses individually and in detail. His loss lists parallel and supplement the comprehensive EoE Luftwaffe Loss data base created and maintained by Peter Cornwell, which was generated separately from the Weiss manuscripts. The Weiss manucripts contain at least 500 detailed maps hand-drawn by Heinrich over template maps to illustrate the specifc events portrayed in his accounts. The whole thing is a complete tour-de-force of the airwar for the period, with about an 80% emphasis on the German side of the story. It is now somewhat dated, as a lot of new information has come to light in perhaps the last 20 years or so, but it remains to this day one of the essential reference works on its subject.

When Heinrich died, his widow attempted to donate his archive (contained in something like 134 thick volumes of material), which includes tens of thousands of pages of backup source material, to the Budnesarchiv, and at least one German University that I know about. They turned her down. For several years, nothing happened until one of our EoE Working Group members tracked this material down, executed the purchase of it on behalf of the EoE project, and with his wife drove a van stuffed to the ceiling with binders from Barvaria to Holland where it was initially stored for a couple of years. It has now been moved to Britain, from where we are coordinating the continuing work to fully make the materials accessible in English. As well as physical possession of the archive, I acquired from the family the copyright to all of Heinrich's research and writing on the subject. This was done with a formal legal agreement executed in both German and English. The basic manuscripts, probably about 6,000 pages in total, is what I've been having translated for the EoE project. It will likely take another two years to finish it through 31.12.40. What remains to be done is 01.09.39 to 09.05.40 and from 01.11.40 to 31.12.40. One volume in the April - early May, 1940 period is missing, and we haven't yet been able to locate it. However, since there are two manuscripts covering that period, we can probably re-construct most of the missing material to about the same level of detail. If anyone knows about or has the missing volume, I'd certainly appreciate knowing where it is, as I own the copyright to it and having it would save us a lot of trouble re-creating the missing material from the second manuscript and the backup research material.

Regarding your specific request for information about He219 stuff, I haven't seen anything about that, and my impression is that that would have been later in the war. I must admit, however, that I haven't read into the Jan-July, 1941 part of the manuscript. Also note that Heinrich's work focused on Luftwaffe operations, not on aircraft development and hardware.

In summary, this is a gold mine of information based upon dedicated years of research in the German archives and related archives on the Allied side, as well as all published sources known to Heinrich up to the time of his death. I've shared some of it on this board in response to specific questions, where it hasn't been too burdensome to do so. This I will continue to do in support of the larger research community, because it is my intention that this material be shared with others and be made available for the benefit of all. The 14 volumes (or more) planned for the EoE publishing project will make use of this material, but will go far beyond it in telling the story of the 1939-40 air war. I don't intend to just publish translations of the Weiss materials, but integrate his materials into comprehensive accounts, with massive supporting references and appendices, of the various phases of European air ops during this period of time. As I've stated recently on this board, I fully expect to publish 10-15 thousand photos to illustrate the story, as well as illustrating the various volumes with a very large number of maps, hundreds (if not thousands) of color profiles of the aircraft of all sides, and extremely detailed maps.

To give a better idea of what this material contains, here is a list of the chapter and paragraph subheads from one of the daily accounts during the Battle of Britain. I've just chosen 15.10.40 at random. The translation is 23 single-spaced typewritten pages long, plus there are extensive appendices and attachments for maps and detailed losses on both sides that run several more pages:

Baltic Sea: Fl.Fhr.East

North Sea: FdLuft

Atlantic: Coastal Command

English Coast: Weather

Daylight activities:
Luftflotte 3: Reconnaissance. Results; Harassing attacks; Fighter sweep by Jafü 3; RAF;
Daylight activities:
Luftflotte 2: Reconnaissance, Shipping traffic, Photo-reconnaissance, Nuisance raids, Nuisance raids on London by Jafü 2, forenoon attacks, Royal Air Force, afternoon attacks, early evening attack, Daylight raids – summary,

Night operations: Luftflotte 3, Nuisance raids, Air Corps IV, Air Corps V; Major attack on London; Luftflotte 2, Major attack on London, Night attacks – summary, east London, city center, west London

Mine-laying operations of 9 Air Division, Victims of aerial mines,

Luftwafffe

Fighter Command

Coastal Command

Bomber Command: German Coast, daylight operations, night operations, Attack on shipyards at Kiel, Alternative targets

RAF Minelaying Operations

Occupied Territories: Dutch Coast: daylight operations, Coastal Command; night operations, Bomber Command, No 2 Group, No 3 Group, No 4 Group, No 5 Group, Coastal Command, “Windmill” operation; Belgian-North French Coast (with all sublistings as above for Holland), No 1 Group, Alternative Targets, Coastal Command; North French Coast: Navy Group West, Bomber Command; West French Coast: Coastal Command.

I hope Marcel, that this answers your questions and those of a lot of other people.

Regards,
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  #46  
Old 10th March 2012, 09:04
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Marcel Hogenhuis Marcel Hogenhuis is offline
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Re: The Eagles Over Europe (EOE) Project

Hello Larry,

Many, many thanks for this far more extensive answer but a very enlighting one! Wow!
I must apologize for that I did not look back in your earlier postings on this subject and I hope you did not feel offended that I was asking about the origins of the Weiss collection.

I very well know that even before I was born (in 1963) already people were busy to research the airwar but apart from Winfried Bock, Hans Ring, Gebhard Aders and some others, I never heard about Heinrich Weiss (as I said: hail the ignorants). This might be explained also by the fact that I always had focussed on the nocturnal war between the German nightfighters and RAF Bomber Command.

Keep up the (very) good work, I don't envy you about the huge amount of work but it will become an everlasting testimony of your determination to carry on with this important historical subject.

Again many thanks for taking the time to reply so extensively! All the best,

Marcel / Venlo
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