In Memory of 11-26-44

[ccheese]

Erich: This is powerful reading. I only ready part 4, but will read all of it
at home. Like the man said... war is hell !

Charles

 

[drgondog]

the 491st bomb group suffers at the hands of my cousins JG 301. My cousin was KIA on this mission .......... RIP .......... the US and Luftwaffe

read it for yourself from the 491st bg files

Ringmasters-Part 4

Erich ~

Erich - great catch on the article. I did note several errors by the author.

First the Second Scout Force was comprised in almost equal proportions, volunteer bomber pilots and fighter pilots. Initial cadre of both Experimental and 2nd Scouts were from 355th, including Whalen... but several came in from 4th and 479th.

Second, the 355th as you know, 'dribbled' out a reaction force to each wave of Fw 190s a squadron at a time, trying to keep the B-24s protected, but there simply were too many to stop. The author seemed to convey a sense that the 355th just departed 'en masse' to go chasing.. the Luftwaffe deserves credit for a well planned, overwhelming, and staggered attack.

Last the 491st and 445th and 389th? were scattered all over the place from a formation point of view. There was a reason the controllers put 150-200 fighters in that general area.

Having said the above it is a great article on a bad day all around.

BTW I speak and email w/Bill Getz all the time and will include an article he wrote about the Scouts in the new ABD.. if you want to get to him, let me know.

Bill

 

[v2]

for heros

 

[drgondog]

Erich, how many aircraft total were committed by each side this fateful day?

Matt - Hard to describe. The 339th was flying an Area Sweep as I recall and were out in front of the bomber stream, the 355th was flying Target Escort for this particular (2nd) Bomb Wing of three groups, the 361st was in trail with a following Combat Wing.

In this particular cube of airspace it was 2CW of B-24s, 355th FG of Mustangs and 2nd Scout Force Mustangs. The 355th, as I noted earlier, attacked the German force, described as several gaggles of 60-75 fighters each, in squadron level attacks, one at a time as the Germans attacked.

The 355th were now fully engaged from 25,000 feet to the deck but one unmolested Gaggle of Fw 190s were free to attack the B-24 force.

The section of 2nd SF P-51's were target weather scouts going in and bomb results (in trail) going out. They were the ONLY Mustangs meeting the last wave of JG301 Fw 190 Sturms attacking the 491st and probably responsible for saving them from annhilation.

They got 5 confirmed, two probable and 2 damaged in their attack on 100+ Fw 190s with no losses.

The 355th got 20 more with no losses in the fight but lost two to a mid air collision over the North Sea on the last leg home.

I will have to do some checking but the 2CBW (389, 445 and 491st) put up around 120+ B-24s to attack Misburg, the 355th had 40 Mustangs, the 2nd SF had 8.

All of these guys were within 15 miles of each other - in the same space as JG301 and the high cover of JG6 Me 109s.

Erich will have a better handle on the actual numbers but the 355th and 2SF Encounter Reports talk of separate waves of 60-75+ fighters with over 200 described in the attacking force of Fw 190s and Me 109s.

That would put approximately 400 aircraft in a couple of cubic miles of air, all screwing around with each other.

Regards,

Bill

 

[Erich]

one of the tough nutz here is how many JG 301 Fw's made it to the forward B-17 boxes as they traveled up the bomber stream to create more carnage, JG 6 was up here along with JG 1 and some of the claims are confusing by the LW. In this case for JG 301 maybe 7-8 for the Geschwader stab, and at least 10-15 per staffel, 3 staffels for I. gruppe, II. gruppe and III.gruppe all flying Fw 190A-8's and A-9's with variations, some of them have A-8/R2's. It is easily conceivable that JG 301 could muster up 120 maybe even 150 Fw's if up to full strength figures and that I do not have in my files...............yet.

 

[DBII]

Such brave men. Thank you for sharing the story.

DBII

 

[Wurger]

for all of these heros

 

[Crumpp]

one of the tough nutz here is how many JG 301 Fw's made it to the forward B-17 boxes as they traveled up the bomber stream to create more carnage, JG 6 was up here along with JG 1 and some of the claims are confusing by the LW. In this case for JG 301 maybe 7-8 for the Geschwader stab, and at least 10-15 per staffel, 3 staffels for I. gruppe, II. gruppe and III.gruppe all flying Fw 190A-8's and A-9's with variations, some of them have A-8/R2's. It is easily conceivable that JG 301 could muster up 120 maybe even 150 Fw's if up to full strength figures and that I do not have in my files...............yet.

I agree Eric it is a tough nut to nail down.

The trends I have noticed is the Luftwaffe tends to run about ~50% of authorized strength at the tip of the spear on average.

The other thing to consider is JAFU's control ability. The Gruppe was the largest element the German system could effectively control. It would have been a series of Gruppe's independently vectored to the stream and not a cohesive Wing.

IIRC they added a Gruppe and Staffle to expand the organizational strength. Much like the RAF expanded during the BoB. I will have to check my dates on this.

Sorry to hear about your cousin. Although we tend to focus on the machines, it is really all about the men.

I think Bill has some good numbers on the USAAF presence.

All the best,

Crumpp