Friendly fire WWII

[Brian]

Hi guys

I have just joined your honourable guild of aviation experts. I am conducting research into friendly fire incidents for my new book. I am interested in all such incidents concerning misidentification in the air during WWII, and seek your help. My two-volume study covers all air forces, in all theatres of the war. Quite an undertaking, no doubt you will agree. My draft already contains hundreds of recorded incidents but I am sure there are more to be uncovered. Please help!

[vingtor]

Well, as one airman once said "there's nothing friendly with friendly fire".

Nils

[en830]

A recent issiue of After the Battle gives a classic example of Friendly fire concerning the loss of Douglas Bader in 1941.

[Paul]

Brian,

George Preddy is one of those sad examples....

http://www.preddy-foundation.org/


Paul

[John Beaman]

Brian, if you wish to do George Preddy, contact me OB. There is a lot more to the story we have discovered over the years (I was involved in much of the original research for the Preddy book), including two accidental shoot downs the first of which took us 20 years to discover WAS NOT Preddy, but the second one was, but both were 8th AAF aces!

John

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Brian, are you researching only air-to-air friendly fire, or also interested in air-to-ground, ground-to-air, air-to-sea and sea-to-air mishaps ? Only to speak of cases where aircraft were involved.

As for A2A friendly fire, the French book about the Armée de l'Air claims in 1940 ("LES VICTOIRES DE L’AVIATION DE CHASSE FRANÇAISE LES VICTOIRES DE L’AVIATION DE CHASSE FRANÇAISE", two book by Arnaud Gillet) is showing some cases of British-French friendly fire I have never seen elsewhere (but I should admit the 1940 campain is not my study subject).

[Paul]

Hi John,

We're still trying to find any remains of George Preddy's a/c.....I'm in contact with both Joe N. and Joe H. for that.

Take care,

Paul

[noahbjr]

I, too, have just joined the group thanks to Paul Patist. And I would encourage you, Brian, to get in touch with John Beaman and Sam Sox re the friendly fire incident that killed my cousin, George Preddy. They have done a tremendous amount of research on this one!

Best regards,

Joe Noah, PMF

[Paul]

Joe,

Welcome here !


Paul

[Brian]

Hi guys

Thanks for the various comments re my quest for friendly fire (blue-on-blue)incidents. I do intend to include air-to-air, air-to-ground and ground-to-air, plus other related incidents such 'white-on-blue' (attacks on Allied/Axis aircraft by neutral aircraft), 'blue-on-white' (attacks on neutral aircraft by Allied/Axis aircraft), aircraft collisions with (own) barrage balloons, etc.

Please understand that I am not sensationalising such incidents but consider they are an important part of aviation history which tends to be overlooked by historians.

Nils - of course you are correct - no such animal as 'friendly' fire! And yes, Ian, I have picked up on the Bader incident. Its is apparent that I do not have full details of the George Preddy incident and will follow up on your suggestions Paul, John and Joe.

Laurent - among my many failings is an inability to read French very well - are you able to translate for me the incidents mentioned in Arnaud Gillet's book? If this is too great a task, may I ask you to provide further details of the book to enable me to purchase a copy? Many thanks.

Have a nice one and keep smiling

Brian