Seeking info on Walter Borchers' Bf110 in the Battle of Britain

[Matt G]

I'm trying to determine markings of any Bf110s flown by Ltn. Walter Borchers (later a night fighter Experte) in the Battle of Britain. This is part of a modelling project (with some research into Battle of Britain Bf110 aces who went on to become night fighter Experte for personal interest).

I do have one clue to go off. On eBay here there was a photo of a Bf110 coded ??+FM. Unfortunately the photo appears to have been removed and I haven't seen it.

It has been suggested on this forum that this aircraft may be M8+FM and flown by Borchers as the fin displayed 10 victory markings, although apparently there were no shark’s mouth markings (normally standard on 4./ZG76 aircraft). However, I given the lack of unit markings mentioned, I think the same criteria (ten victory tabs and the “??+FM” code) could equally apply to Rolf Kaldrack of 4./ZG1.

Any thoughts? And does anyone have a photo of Borchers' aircraft during the Battle of Britain? (This may be a tall order but you never know!).

Thanks in advance!

Matt

[PMoz99]

Do you know when in 1940 Borchers became Staka 5./ZG76? It seems that may have been after the BoB, but I don't have a date.
According to an Il2 game skin, Borchers flew an E-2 coded M8+BN as Staka. Whilst I have no idea where they got their info from, I have checked other profiles from that source in the past and in those cases their info was correct.

Their info is -
M8+TC of Maj. Erich Groth, Gr.Kdr. II./ZG76
M8+HM of Oblt. Wilhelm Herget, StaKa 4./ZG76
M8+BN of Oblt. Walter Borchers, StaKa 5./ZG76
M8+NP of Hptm. Nacke, StaKa 6./ZG76 (My note - I believe Jabs flew a similarly coded C-2 in May 1940)
M8+IP of Oblt. H-J Jabs, 6./ZG76

BTW the thread you linked to mentions FM, not KM. Typo?

Peter

[Matt G]

Thanks Peter.

Yes, the +KM was a typo (which I've fixed), I did mean +FM. I'd just been looking through "Battle of Britain Then & Now" (p.613) and discovered that Nacke also apparently flew "M8+KM" (W.Nr.3603) on 31 August 1940.

I'm unsure about dates when Borchers became StaKa of 5./ZG76 (Wikipedia suggests Autumn 1940). However, to confuse the matter, Jan J. Safarik's website lists all of Borchers' victories from 1940 as 4./ZG76 (according to this, his last victory of 1940 was on 11 September). On the other hand, Wikipedia suggests Borchers was in 5./ZG76 from 1 September 1939 until his Staffel became 8./NJG3 in Autumn 1941.

Christer Bergstom in his Battle of Britain book conveniently gets around this by saying Borchers was in II./ZG76.