Losses of german nightfighters - night 19/20 February 1943

[Faenor]

Hi,

I'm looking for an overview of losses of German night-fighters for the night 19/20 February 1943.

The rear gunner Sgt. Wilcock from 466.Sq reported in in this night destruction of Me 110 (in flame hit the sea) - see link.

http://www.halifaxlv827.co.uk/he531.htm
http://www.lostbombers.co.uk/bomber.php?id=4829

466 sq. machine (Wellington B Mk.X HE531) was damaged in battle and then crashed on landing.

I would be grateful for any losses of german nightfighters for the night, if it is traceable

Faenor

[Stig Jarlevik]

Faenor

As per Khorat's two books, there were no German losses this night.
Neither did any German fighter claim specifically your Wellington.

What the crew unfortunately saw was one of their own bombers fall into the sea. I think this was a quite common occurance during the night war....

B Rgds
Stig

[Faenor]

Hi Stig,

crew reported two attacks by German fighter jet - look at the link (page 12)
http://www.awm.gov.au/catalogue/rese...9125z015_1.pdf

It is possible to compare this fight with reports of German night fighters, if not one of the kills - I´m interesting, if any of the night fighters attacked three times same bomber? Then, I saw enough imagination in same area to double attack machine HE531 and then shot down another machine, the crew saw machine HE531 and reported the victory.

Faenor

[Stig Jarlevik]

Faenor

Don't know how accurate the German reports are and if it is possible to link any possible claim to HE531.
Suffice to say that all claims made that night has been tied in with known RAF losses by Theo Boiten in his Vol 1 of Nachtjagd War Diaries.

As far as I am concerned, one of the Luftwaffe pilots that night may have claimed HE531 but actually received credit for another found wreck. It is always difficult to tie in claims vs losses, but at this stage I am perfectly happy with Dr Boiten's theories.

B Rgds
Stig

[Faenor]

Hi,

I fully understand and agree, that Theo Boiten's books are excellent.

In this case - Theo Boiten can be contacted via e-mail? In the case of fetch the contact I'd be very grateful.

Faenor

[Marcel Hogenhuis]

Hello

I am sorry to disappoint you Stig but according to my Bf110 database there was actually a loss:

Bf110 C-4 (Wnr. 2158) of 5./NJG 3, unit code D5+?N, production code KD+UB, crashed in PQ. 8555 (the Northsea west of St.Peter/Germany) after an aerial fight.
Pilot Fw. Otto Hagn (born 6.2.1920) and wireless operator Uffz. Walter Prinzel (26.6.1920) were missing, most likely killed.

[sources: IWM, Reel 8 Luftwaffe losses and WASt Berlin, Namentliche Verlustmeldung, signed by Hptm. Hans Bär, temporarily Gruppenkommandeur of II./NJG 3]

It matches quite well with the description given in the first posting.
All the best,

Marcel Hogenhuis
Study Group Venlo Airfield in WW-2

[Stig Jarlevik]

Marcel

You are never disappointing
However, as most already realise, I use secondary sources since primary research is out of my reach.
The loss you describe as occuring 19/20 Feb 1943 is listed by Michael Balss as occuring the night before, that is 18/19 Feb, in both his books.
In his second book he updates the information still quoting the same date (18/19 Feb) saying both crewmembers were killed and that the aircraft code was D5+CN.
As to the correct date, I have no idea, but perhaps you can verify 100% you have the correct date and not Michael?

Cheers
Stig

[Faenor]

Hi Marcel and Stig,

this is history in the quest for beautiful and full of contradictions.

On the one hand, the potential success of Sgt. Wilcock from 466 SQ, which possibly win a duel with a German night fighter, when most of those fights ended just exactly the opposite - I can imagine typing error in entering a loss of the crew from 5./NJG one day (is possibly to verify date of death of crew members from another source?).

On the other hand, there is still the possibility that a crew of Wellington HE 531 saw in the dark the fate of their less fortunate friends and enjoying the battle (stress, adrenaline, night, loss of a crew member or the loss of SQ 466 in the preceding weeks - January 1943 5 machines loss, night 14/15 February 1 loss and other crash landed in accidents) reported the kill of Me 110.

Thanks to both for their contributions and look forward to decipher the fragments of the air war in the night sky.

Faenor

[Marcel Hogenhuis]

Hello Stig,

I will check the date in the Namentliche Verlustmeldung but I am pretty confident that it is correct, because the entry in my database is backed up with 3 sources for this crash:

Primary source 1: copy of the Namentliche Verlustmeldung of the WASt Berlin

Primary source 2: copied data of the Gen. Qm. Abt.6 loss lists, microfilm reel 8 of the IWM Miscelaneous collection

Secondary source: Verlusten bei den Nachtjagdgeschwader, Gemeinschaft der Jagdflieger, compilation of H.Höhler (who typed out the handwritten loss lists of Winfried Bock who copied it... from the Namentliche Verlustmeldungen!
In the early days of my research I had no copies of the NVM's and Balss wasn't even dreaming about publishing NJG losses in the next 10 years. Therefore, Höhlers compilation was my first and single source for NJG losses.
As it later turned out: Winfried's handwritten 9 looks like an 8 and have been misread by Höhler > thus resulting in many erronous Werkenummer and dates, which no sooner could be corrected unless I finally got copies of the NVM's of the NJG's myself.

All the best, Marcel

[Khorat]

You find the loss also in "Deutsche Nachtjagd Personalverluste in Ausbildung und Einsatz" the date is given with 18./19.2.1943 - sorry that happend several times in this first part.
Maybe the loss of Do 217 J-2 1258 at Georgsheil - 10 km west of Aurich, also happend in the night 19./20.2.1043 - sorry the copy´s of the NVM´s are in germany right now.

khorat - Michael Balss