Using Ultra to research the Luftwaffe

[Franek Grabowski]

I do. I find it a very slow process either online or downloaded to browse the files. Also, if individual pictures would be posted online, a few persons should be able to quickly tag it in basic categories like army, air force or navy.

[Nick Beale]

Originally Posted by Franek Grabowski

I do. I find it a very slow process either online or downloaded to browse the files. Also, if individual pictures would be posted online, a few persons should be able to quickly tag it in basic categories like army, air force or navy.

TNA is a British public service and as such receives neither the money nor the people to do such a desirable thing.

As for it being a slow process, that’s my whole experience of Luftwaffe research!

[Franek Grabowski]

I do not mean it should be made by TNA (which is funded from taxes anyway), but perhaps by some group of interest.

Life is too short, so I believe that where is a chance to make it faster, it should be done.

[Moriii]

About copying the HW5: I believe some have made the effort. I have seen private catalogs with hundreds of them. It should more be a matter of finding the person with the relevant copy than duplicating the effort.

As a matter of fact, we would probably all be better off should we pool the files we copied in isolation.

[righidan]

Dear friends,
As these posts show, the value of the ULTRA intercepts for studying the Luftwaffe history is indisputable.
While the best source are the original messages, the material included in the DEFE 3 files is enormous, and it is freely accessible from every part of the word, and downloadable to your PC for your personal research.
One of the problems with these files is that there is no system to how the files are catalogued which makes researching a particular period rather cumbersome.
To overcome this problem, I have prepared a guide that I think could be useful to some other researchers.
I post it here, hoping that younger researchers with more time could use it, to bring benefit to everybody.
In the meanwhile if you had crash reports, prisoner interrogations and similar material on the III./ZG 26 during its Mediterranean stay, I could find some use for them…
Regards
Daniele

[Nick Beale]

I have prepared a guide that I think could be useful to some other researchers.

Congratulations on your efforts. I am sure many members will be grateful to you.

there is no system to how the files are catalogued which makes researching a particular period rather cumbersome.

There are ways around this. I made a guide to Army/Luftwaffe DEFE 3 files but for 1944/45 only. I did that for my own research when the file index was only on paper but now the online National Archives catalague offers another (much simpler!) possibility for earlier years.

Go to the National Archives Advanced Search page:

• in the "Exact word or phrase" box, type: CAIRO
• in the "Any of these references" box, type: DEFE 3
• in the "Date / from / to" boxes, type [for example]: 1942 and 1943
• The hit the "Search" button and when the results appear, you will see they are sorted by "relevance". Change that to "Date - ascending" and you have the list of files for the year(s) you asked for.

Specifying CAIRO should (I hope) help avoid the many series of naval messages which are also in DEFE 3.

Be warned that for the period before March 1941 you must go to the HW 5 series and that is on paper only.