Orders regarding disposal of bomb loads

[CornwallPhil]

I have come across an entry in a UK Regiment War Diary that states:
"5 April 1941 0119 2 HEs dropped on the foreshore Falmouth Bay. No casualties. Slight damage to windows. Aircraft returning from North crossed coast near Lizard, returned and released bombs passing over Docks. Probable objective - Docks."

My question is this: Were Luftwaffe crews issued with specific instructions as to where they should 'dump' their bombs before returning home or was this just an opportunistic event done on the initiative of this particular crew? The fact they passed well south of Falmouth, turned to come and drop their bombs there, before proceeding home shows it was a deliberate and chosen act but this doesn't appear to be a secondary target as from what I can gather the main raid at the time was on Coventry and I would have thought secondary targets would have been in the Midlands.

I'd be grateful for any enlightenment.

[edwest]

This Luftwaffe example indicates the pilot made a choice based on his aircraft damage and opposition encountered. Or it was an attempt to confuse defenders as to the primary target by dropping part of his bombs on one location and then the other.




Hope this helps,
Ed

[Chris Goss]

The main targets that night were Avonmouth, Portsmouth, Southampton and Warmwell but there were a number of diversionary attacks. As Falmouth is quite a distance away, perhaps this was one such attack but the unit and results were never recorded

[Andrew Arthy]

Hi,

From German records, I guess this is 'your' aircraft:

"Außerdem als Ausweichziele
...
0215 Uhr Hafen- und Dockenlagen von Falmouth durch 1 weiteres Kampfflugzeug aus 1300 m Flughöhe mit 1 SD 1400 und 1 SC 500, deren Detonation in den Dockanlagen einwandfrei erkannt wurde."

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

[CornwallPhil]

Many thanks for your comments.
Thanks Andy for sharing the German records.
I have found a reference in the Cornwall Air Raid Records to a small number of bombs being dropped on RAF St Eval and RNAS St Merryn about 2100 hours on the 4th April, so I guess it's possible this plane was in some way connected with that raid although this incident is 4 hours later. Whether the Cornish airfield raid were one of the diversionary attacks that Chris mentions I don't know.
Anyway it seems that the German plane on crossing the coast near the Lizard recognised where it was and chose to divert north to hit a known military target defended by AA guns. Luckily for the people of Falmouth the bombs hit the rocky foreshore between Pendennis Castle and Swanpool Beach. A few shattered windows was the only damage.