..well-known ebayer Rich Carrick has a nice selection of German language titles on offer in a 'private' sale. Thanks to Rich I have just acquired Siegfried Radtke's KG 54 Chronik " Von der Ju 52 zur Me 262 " (Schild Verlag).
Uffz. Siegfried Radtke was a Beobachter in 9./KG 54. Flying out of Decimomannu, Sardinia, Radtke and his crew were injured on 5 June 1943 when they were forced to bale out of Ju 88 B3+CT WNr 142481 in darkness after a long night sortie over North Africa which saw them returning on one engine before finally running out of fuel. Radtke himself appears in the photo at the top of page 186. On page 216 he describes a bombing sortie flown by his crew in Ju 88 B3+IT on the night of 26-27 July 1944 from Soesterberg over Giberville south-east of Caen in Normandy. Attacked by night fighters and then hit by anti-aircraft fire over the target area, the port wing of the Junkers was quickly ablaze. Although the blaze took hold and burned vigorously the port wing tanks were full, so, according to the author. " there was little danger of an explosion..". The crew elected to fly on and put down at the nearest 'friendly' airfield which was Le Culot where they carried out a successful belly landing at 03:00. The aircraft (which appears as 'JT' in Radtke's loss lists, W.Nr unknown) sustained 60% damages..
" ..in seconds we had scrambled clear of the machine and with the fire brigade and ambulance in attendance our "IT" disappeared under a mountain of foam. Suddenly all the lights on the airfield were extinguished. There was a sound of engines. Our 'colleagues from the other side' had arrived on the scene - too late! Then we heard voices calling out; " ..where is the crew? " By the light of a pocket lamp (torch) we were met by the Kommodore of KG 30, Obstl. Freiherr von Gravenreuth. Later back in the ops building he said ; " Mensch ..goddamn boys you were lucky there! Two nights ago another Ju 88 came in ablaze, attempted what you've just done ..and exploded 100 meters above the field! " We swallowed hard and toasted our Geburtstag ('birthday'). Later we set out by train via Brussels and Rotterdam and eventually arrived back at Soesterberg where we were warmly welcomed home.."
Rich has a lot of other nice and often hard-to-find Luftwaffe books for sale too; Kock's NJG 6 book and Peter Achs' Fw 191 title to mention just a couple.. You can contact Rich via the **** or the Luftwaffe SIG on Facebook. Visit these sites to see the full range of books available in Rich's private sale..
A blog post devoted to rare Luftwaffe books on Ebay