Night Fighter Questions

[David P. Williams]

On 1st August 1942, Hauptmann Herbert Bonsch of III./NJG 2, was killed in a flying accident near Gilze-Rijen. According to Ader's book, III./NJG 2 became II./NJG 2 in the same month - does anyone know the exact date this occurred and who became its Kommandeur before Dr. Horst Patuschka took over on 3rd December 1942.

I am also looking for information and christian name for a H. Kruse, who apparently flew with 5./NJG 4. Does anyone know anything about this man, or an Otto Platz, unit unknown.

Thank you in advance for any help concerning these queries.

[Marcel Hogenhuis]

Hello David,

Searching for entries about you in the TOCH your question about II.NJG 2 came up. What happened is this:
On 1 October 1942, the II.NJG 2 in Leeuwarden (in november 1941 created from the 4./NJG 1 und Helmut Lent), was renamed in IV.NJG 1. So, the NJG 1 was compleet: from north to south > IV.NJG 1 Leeuwarden, III.NJG 1 Twente, I.NJG 1 Venlo and II.NJG 1 St.Trond/Belgium.

A ´new´ II.NJG 2 was formed from the III.NJG 2 and according to my information, Hptm. Horst Patuschka was its first commander.

Best regards, Marcel Hogenhuis

[Tex Waite]

The reference to Hauptmann Herbert Bonsch being killed in an air accident is wide of the mark. On the night of 31 Jul/1 Aug he was patrolling in his 'personal' JU-88, with two ME-109s of his squadron. They spotted a lone Halifax bomber making landfall over the Dutch coast. One of the ME-109s stood off whilst the other two aircraft attacked. The Halifax was raked stern to nose and wingtip to wingtip; the mid-upper gun turret took a direct hit, killing gunner Mac McAuley. The rear gunner, US citizen PO Sam Glasgow of Wallace NC shouted for the pilot, PO Ron Waite to dive to port - who responded sufficiently quickly for the JU-88, attacking from the rear, to enter his field range. Glasgow scored a direct hit on Hauptmann Bonsch's aircraft which was seen to plunge to earth. The attacking ME-109 was damaged by Mac McAuley before he died. This aircraft returned to base and reported the circumstances of the death of Hauptmann's crew at the hands of a Halifax rear gunner. They believed the Halifax sufficiently damaged to have crashed into the North Sea - but although all instruments (inc. the ASI) were lost, and flying controls badly damaged, the Halifax remained airborne and the surviving crew returned to England and baled out successfully. Navigator Canadian Bob Poole had been injured in the battle - shrapnel had opened his wrist to the bone; he rejected morphine so that he could better plot a dead-reckoned route back across the North Sea. At debrief, their story was treated with incredulity - RAF intelligence at the time was that Luftwaffe fighter pilots were forbidden to attack lone aircraft in pairs or more. It beggars belief that despite their incredulity, the debriefing hierachy released the story to the press - and all daily papers & the radio carried the story the next day. Eventually, in 1981, Dutch author/historian Hans Onderwater, reconciled the crew's version of the events with the Luftwaffe's record of the battle. Later, in the last week of 1994, Hauptmann Bonsch, his crew and aircraft were discovered in new building foundation excavations (this, despite German authorities in 1942, telling the crew's families that the bodies had been recovered from the aircraft and buried). This story was widely covered in the British National Press on New Year's Eve, 1994.

None of the Halifax's crew ever received any decoration for anything. Ron Waite's wartime autobiography 'Death Or Decoration' was published by Newton in 1991. It's only print run of 5,000 sold out.

So, there was NOTHING accidental about Herbert Bonsch's demise.

Regards,

PR (Tex) Waite - eldest son of pilot (Sq Ldr) Ron Waite, now 94, a resident of Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset.