205 Group losses 6-7 July 1944 Feuersbrunn raid

[Theo Boiten]

Dear all,

I am trying to analyse the events during the 205 Group 6-7 July 1944 raid on Feuersbrunn airfield, when 13 of the attackers failed to return -NJG6 and NJG101 were credited with 14 bombers destroyed during this night. I would like to get details about the individual losses on this raid, especially the locations where they crashed, and the time & cause of the individual losses; and is there perhaps any literature available on this raid? I have the following details about 12 of the 13 losses:

Wellington MF241 of 37 Sqn 3 KIA & 2 PoW
Wellington LN759 of 40 Sqn 5 KIA
Wellington LP210 of 40 Sqn 5 KIA
Wellington JA540 of 70 Sqn 5 KIA
Wellington JA471 of 70 Sqn 5 KIA
Wellington LP267 of 40 Sqn 4 KIA & 1 PoW
Wellington LP198 of 70 Sqn 5 KIA
Wellington LP130 of 70 Sqn 3 KIA & 2 PoW
Wellington LP499 of 104 Sqn 5 KIA
Liberator BZ930 of 178 Sqn 4 KIA & 3 PoW
Liberator EV822 of 178 Sqn 6 KIA (cr. Yugoslavia)
Halifax JP287 of 614 Sqn 6 KIA

A 14th aircraft, Wellington LP465 of 70 Sqn was hit by a Do217, the aircraft struggling back to Foggia where it force-landed. Are there any combat reporrts available re. this incident?

Cheers and thanks for any information!

Theo

[udf_00]

http://lostaircraft.com/database.php?lang=en
type Feuersbrunn select Destination click Search

[Theo Boiten]

Cheers & thanks for the tip -I've gathered a number of crash locations for the 6/7 July 1944 losses from the site!

Cheers, Theo

[Fanair]

Hello Theo, I think there is something about this raid in "Out of the Italian Nignt" by Maurice Lihou


Yours friendly

Alain

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Hello Theo,

From my experience from the http://lostaircraft.com/database.php?lang=en, the crash location given is not always accurate. For examples, some US losses have as crash location the location written on the first page of the MACR, that was often the "last place seen" rather than the real crash location, while there is in the MACR a German KU report giving the precise crash location.

What is interesting in this database is the Comment Field, where there may be many details, and the Source one.

This database is filled by contributors from the Internet, so entries can be really interesting or totally wrong, as in two other comparable databases on the Net:
http://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/
http://www.crashplace.de/index.php?page=70
(to be honest, I am a member of the admin team of the second, but we have nothing about the above losses)

[Laurent Rizzotti]

The Australian Archives had digitalized casualty files for a crew belonging to the Wellington LP499: http://naa12.naa.gov.au/scripts/Imagine.asp?B=1073208

Other files exist for losses suffered this night but are not digitalized:
MF138 (not in your list): http://naa12.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetri...arcode=1068053
JP287 (in your list as JB287, a Lancaster serial): http://naa12.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetri...arcode=1077385
LP130 (typo LR130 in database): http://naa12.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetri...arcode=1065857

For the latter casualties, you can fin details in Storr files about Australian aircrew casualties.
For 70 Sqn: http://www.awm.gov.au/catalogue/rese...9125z004_1.pdf (MF138, LP130 (written LR130))
For 614 Sqn: http://www.awm.gov.au/catalogue/rese...9125z008_1.pdf (JP287)

On this link, http://www.rafcommands.com/forum/sho...-Halifax-JP287, you will find a link to the MRES report for JP287 and LP499.

On the fold3 website, you can find in the MACR area daily lists of German crash reports, listing USAAF but also RAF and other Western Allies. On the July 1944 file, there is (in the early hours of the 7th) a series of Allied bombers in Austria: each entry as a location, a time and a report code (ME xxx or KSE xxx), but for these entries there is no serial, as it is the case for other losses:
http://www.fold3.com/image/251/38657392/ (and next page)

Hope it helps

Edited: the above crash reports lists are available on the fold3 website for 1943 (one file, covering the whole year), 1944 (one file per month) and 1945 (one file, covering up to March 1945 with less and less records). They are not complete but are still very useful.

[Theo Boiten]

Hello Laurent and Alain,

Cheers and thanks for the links and info, very useful indeed! I will gather the info on the Fels-am-Wagram raid losses & compare these to the German NJ claims on 6-7 July 1944.

Cheers, Theo

[Fanair]

Theo

you 've also a lot of informations in Air of authority website :http://www.rafweb.org/ about casualties during this raid (in the member's area)

good evening

Alain