Russians bomb Berlin 13 September 1942

[Brian]

Hi guys

I understand that Sgt Alexis Stadnik was a Russian airman who successfully baled out his aircraft (type and unit unknown) on the night of 12/13 or 13/14 September 1942 during a raid on Berlin.

Sgt Stadnik and a companion escaped temporary captivity and reached Belgium where they were spirited away by the Comete Line and reached England. What was Stadnik's fate? Did he remain in England?

Cheers
Brian

[Col Bruggy]

Brian,

A bit more here: http:www.cometeline.org/fiche072.html (translation instructions on Home Page).

Col.

[HGabor]

Interesting story. On September 13, 1942 the 45 AD DD (746 & 890 AP DD), flying the 4 engine, long range Pe-8s flew missions to Bucharest, Rumania (8 Pe-8, dropping 2 FAB-1000, 16 FAB-500TGA, 22 FAB-250TGA, 4 SAB-100 bombs) and Kiev, Ukraine (one Pe-8, dropping 4 FAB-500TGA bombs).
No combat loss this day, only one 890 AP DD Pe-8 (S/N: 42027, commander: Masalev) was lost in an accident.
Found no such name among the lost long-range aviators on September 12, 13, 14, 1942 neither. I think some data must be incorrect.

Cheers,
Gabor

[HGabor]

890 AP DD Pe-8s (Bogdanov, etc.) bombed Berlin on eg. August 12, 1941.

[Brian]

Thanks Col

Thanks Gabor: So it would seem that Stadnik and his companion baled out over Berlin on 12 August not 13 September, and possibly from a damaged aircraft that returned to base? A Pe-8 of 890-AP DD? (is this the same unit as the mentioned TB30/9?)

Interesting, as you say!

Cheers
Brian

[researcher111]

Gabor

I can only confirm too that Berlin was bombed on Aug 42 by 890 AP ADD and the
case related to the airman may be applying to such date. As into 746 and 890 AP ADD
I have no such records dated Sept 13,'42 / Bucharest ,746 was by then tight
up in Stalingrad area on a long range night bombing a regiment which became
independent by Aug 18,1942. To my knowledge this specific regiment was based
on Moscow region airfields with TB-7. Regarding 890 AP ADD on Sept 13, 42 I have
no information whatsoever except that they were equipped with TB-7's.

Please advise the source of info as into Bucharest raid

[HGabor]

I am afraid this is a very messy story. First of all that "unit" is rather a hand written Cyrillic DB-3F (a plane type), not a unit. "0/9" is I think a Cyrillic F: "ф" there.

By the way, that form is totally different from the ones used by the soviet documents. They used No...... AP DD, or GvAP DD in Cyrillic, of course. If this guy fled to England, I doubt he told the correct information about his unit, base, mission, etc. even to his allies. His name is not listed among the lost long-range aviators either. I did not say that he was downed on Aug.12, 1941. What I am saying is that day/night the soviet long-range 890 AP DD Pe-8s bombed Berlin for sure. I never researched the Berlin raids (not interested), but I think this was not the only one, and definitely not by this regiment alone. But I think the Pe-8s were involved in these raids due to the distance and the carried bomb-load.


See the target lists (=monthly op. record) and the dropped bomb-loads of the 45 AD DD Pe-8 regiments in September, 1942. Marked the September 13, 1942 raids with red. Only Bucharest and Kiev, not Berlin. Berlin in fact was NOT in their menu in the whole month!!!!!!
Cheers,

Gabor

[researcher111]

Gabor

The mission sheet shows Bucharest , though none of my Romanian and Russian sources can point out a target bombed by 746th nor 890th or by any Allied Air Force on Sept 13.42 in Bucharest and the area but October 1942. I wonder what target they ended up bombing in Romania .Please send me more material if you have available. It seems
that on Sept 13,42 , 746th departed Lipetsk. Oh an other thing one of those regiments equipped with TB-7 carried Molotov in 1942 to the US.

[HGabor]

Alright, but I think I won't have much more. This is a marginal area in my research and I kept it only for the Budapest entry in it. That part was correct.
Cheers,
Gabor

[Brian]

Thanks guys,

Most interesting.

Perhaps more will come to light.

Cheers
Brian