Fabulous late-war Luftwaffe photos

[Marc-André Haldimann]

Hi Gang,

This is really a day to be remembered! I just chanced on this amazing serie of unpublished shots showing 15 pictures taken at an unknown Luftwaffe airfield, Mid April 1945, by a GI who "liberated" in one of the hangars a Leica, laden with film. He took those snapshots and brought the Leica and the film back, but forgot to develop the film until he found it again..in 1968!

All pictures are from the Stockum collection. Beware, some are graphic.

Fw 190 D-9, Me 262 and Bf 109 G:
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww28Hangar.htm
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww29Hangar.htm

Bf 109 G-6 W.Nr. unknown "Schwarze 28+J", training unit.
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww222victor.htm
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww218me1091.htm

Bf 109 K-4 W.Nr. 334 209, unit unknown.
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww212Hangar.htm

Bf 109 G-14 W.Nr. 464 362, burnt down:
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww210Hangar.htm

Bf 109 G-14/AS W.Nr. unknown "Weisse 12", 1./JG ?
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww211Hangar.htm

Fw 190 S:
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww213Fw190.htm
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww214Fw190.htm

Engineless Fw 190 A (beware: graphic!)
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww219ruin.htm

Si 204 D "BV+??"
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww215debris1.htm

Ju 88 G
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww217debris3.htm

Miscellaneous:
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww216debris2.htm

All pictures courtesy of Ken Cashion

Cheers
Marc

[Marc-André Haldimann]

I completely forgot about the lone Bf 109 G-12 "Weisse 31" which can be seen behind the burnt out wreck of Bf 109 G-14 W.Nr. 464 362... Sorry!
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww210Hangar.htm


Cheers
Marc

[ChristianK]

Hi Marc,
great search work and a fantastic find. The location might be Köthen. One of the unmarked Fw 190 trainers and the He 111 with "28" written on its rudder appear also in some other photos which were presumably shot at this airfield. You find these attached. Sources are "Grounded Eagles" by Tom Laemlein, the soldiersmuseum.com website (Walter Schreck album) and an expired ebay auction.

Regards,
Christian

[Snautzer]

it is Köthen or at least the Fw190s ones.

[Marc-André Haldimann]

Christian,

Many thanks for your input. Michiel also pointed towards this possibility on LEMB. Any way to be more definitive?

The hangar shown in the Ju 88 G picture does not match up with the one showing the Ka 430 wreck of your old LEMB thread:
http://www.luftwaffe-experten.org/fo...hen#entry62057

BUT: in one of the three pics of Fw 190 A-3 "BH+DG" you posted over on LEMB on 31 July 2011, you can clearly see the same control tower with Flak position built atop of it as in this pic:
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww210Hangar.htm
http://www.luftwaffe-experten.org/fo...hen#entry62057 post no 6.

So it is Köthen!

Thanks Christian and Michiel!
Marc

[ChristianK]

In the past I also had my doubts that all these photos labeled as "Köthen" were actually shot there - especially with Bernburg and Dessau, both large airfields, being so close to this location. To be honest, I am still not a hundred percent convinced in case of the photos showing He 111 "White 28". The panorama shot I attached in post #3 is not a particular good match with the airfield layout of Köthen, but on the other hand, much better than compared to those of Dessau and Bernburg. We will see what the future brings...

P.S.: For some more ID work you might also check Scott Blyth's fabulous photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/2455401...n/photostream/

[PhilippeDM]

Marc,

Superpictures!

Dare I suggest JG301 for the Fw 190 D-9 in the hangar (see http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww28Hangar.htm
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww29Hangar.htm) Those white 14 lettering sound familiar.

Did you also noticed the wreck behind the Bf 109 K? A Bf 109 G white 12 + Seems to a RV band... Red yellow red ??? IIRC there was another variation on the RV band of JG 301. All this because of the cipher font...
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww212Hangar.htm
Same aircraft to be seen on the next picture
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww210Hangar.htm
and Mark also pointed it on
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww211Hangar.htm

[Marc-André Haldimann]

Christian,

thanks for your thoughts and the link to this extraordinary aerial recce picture! Looking at the layout of Köthen, I notice the location of the burnt out Ju 88 G
http://www.stories.windmillpro.com/ww217debris3.htm
can be pinpointed: it is precisely to the left of the right main hangar looking towards the bottom of the recce picture. This is corroborated by:

- the tree line boarding the left lateral hangar wall
- the unmistakable shape of the central building standing amidst the four main hangars.

I think we have now a positive ID of the location.

I checked also the date issue. We know from the narrative told by Ken Cashion, that GI Fred Stockum was in the 3d US Army spearhead which arrived around noon on April 14 at the southern airfield boundary.
He remembers German personal being seen through binoculars running to burn the parked planes (whcih they obviously partly succeeded doing...). The night was spent hearing gun fight and his unit moved the next morning to take over the airfield. There he found an abandoned Leica loaded with a film; he took all told 15 snapshots with the German defenders bodies still where they fell the previous day. According to the known battle chronology, we can thus pinpoint the time too: the pics were taken April 15, 1945.

Reference:
http://www.weissandt-goelzau.de/spur...ie-region.html

Philippe,

I dont mind for the D-9;-)) As for "Weisse 12", you will notice the odd RV band we're looking at: the central band is much larger then the lateral ones. I believe this central band is yellow, the hue being similar to the yellow tail of the wrecked Ju 87 D behind. As for the "lateral bands" they are certainly not 450 mm wide. and seem dark colored too.

Given that no dark/yellow/dark RV band did exist, I surmise that the yellow band was painted over a one color previous RV band, possibly a black JG 53 band, though a green JG 27 can't be totally excluded.

Thanks for attiring my attention on this feature which I didn't see at first.

Cheers
Marc

[Marc-André Haldimann]

Thanks to Padraic Conway, over on LEMB, the "Ju 88 G" is actually a Ju 388, as shown by the BMW 801 TJ tubular exhaust and the four bladed propellers!

Cheers
Marc

[Peter Achs]

The Ju 388 is very likely the L-0, Werk-Nr. 300006. I have a transfer flight from Merseburg to Köthen on 31.03.45. This 388 was for the Ln-Versuchsregiment.

Regards
Peter