296 Verlag set to close

 

Some sad news. According to the email that just dropped, Dr Kurt Braatz is closing his 296 Verlag at the end of the year. 296 Verlag has produced some marvellous titles over the years and some of the best Luftwaffe memoirs and biographies bar none. I'm assuming that this news means there will be no English-language translation of Jules Meimberg's book - my 'favourite' Luftwaffe memoir - or any of the other '296' memoirs and biographies in fact - Josten, Krupinski, Cescotti etc etc. Small consolation, up to year's end (20 December) all remaining stock while available is price-dropped - just 15 euros per volume (63% off listed). Wolfrum, Zorner and Drewes are now OOP.

296 catalogue overview and orders here

 

An extract from Roderich Cescotti's "Langstreckenflug" on this blog - flying the Do 217 M-11

Who collided with the 97th BG B-17 F 'All American' ? - Luftwaffe in Tunisia (2)

 

 The internet it would appear was made for stories like that of the 97th BG B-17 'All American'. 

 "..The 'All American', a B-17 Flying Fortress, seen returning to Biskra, Algeria, after a mid-air collision with a German fighter almost tore the bomber's tail off completely..."

While quite amazing in its own right, the story has been somewhat embellished in the re-telling. Some versions even have the B-17 returning to England. The 'Disciples of flight' web site even uses a German newspaper illustration of a Sturmstaffel Fw 190 ramming attack to illustrate its article. 

The bombing raid was flown from Biskra, Algeria to Tunis on February 1, 1943. The American B-17s - a small force of some 12 unescorted machines - were targeted head-on by the Bf 109s of II./JG 53. As related in his memoir, Jules Meimberg's 11./JG 2 - subordinated to JG 53 in Tunisia - also participated in this action. Meimberg - who had claimed a P-38 over Tunis the previous day - was still testing the frontal pass for attacking 'Ami' bombers, concentrating his fire at the weakest point defensively on the B-17 F. However his luck ran out on February 1, 1943. His Bf 109 G-4 was quickly set alight by the gunners' fire and  Meimberg bailed out badly burnt. He subsequently claimed the B-17 shot down but none were lost. 6./JG 53 ace Fw. Erich Paczia also set up for a frontal pass. According to Steve Birdsall in his 'Pride of Seattle, The Story of the First 300 B-17 Fs', what happened next left indelible impressions on the men at the front of the aircraft. Bombardier Lt. Ralph Burbridge recalled ; “I was firing at it all the way… I figure one of us must have killed the pilot because the plane crashed right into us… When we hit, our plane almost stood up on its tail. Then we went down at a very sharp angle. I thought to myself, ‘boy, this is it’.”
Paczia's wing plowed through the rear fuselage of the 'All American' and the 16-victory German ace plunged to his death. 

Fw. Erich Paczia of 6./JG 53 (left) seen in Comiso during 1942

 

Below; the B-17 managed to fly back to its base and land safely without any crew member injured.

"..Wings ablaze with gunfire, the Messerschmitt pilot aimed his fighter directly at the nose of the 'All American'. The crew aboard the B-17 Flying Fortress had seconds to respond. The bomber’s nose gun flashed in reply. The gunners of the lead bomber joined the fray, raking the air with bullets. At the last moment, the fighter turned to pull away. Suddenly, the pilot froze – one of the American gunners had found their mark. The fighter shot right over the cockpit of the B-17 'All American' with a deafening “whoosh” before plowing into the tail section. The craft shuddered as a tremendous “whoomp!” tore through it..."

A full day-by-day account of the Luftwaffe in Tunisia is related in issue #96 of 'Batailles Aériennes' over 96 A-4 pages, comprising 200 photos and 15 artworks all for 12 euros. Even if you don't read French this is a bargain.

"..From 1940 to late 1942, the Tunisians had seen few Luftwaffe aircraft, except for the few aircraft of the Armistice Commission that had come to verify compliance with the conditions set in June 1940 at Compiègne. This changed in November 1942 when the Allies landed in Algeria and Morocco, catching the Afrika Korps (then in full retreat) in a pincer movement. Mustering all it could, the Wehrmacht rushed in disparate units from land, air and sea to take control of Tunisia, towards which Rommel's army was retreating. On the ground, the Heer was initially able to block the advance of the enemy forces, while in the air, the Luftwaffe stepped up all kinds of operations: fighter and bomber escort sorties, ground attack, reconnaissance and also supply operations following the creation of an air bridge linking Europe to Africa. Airborne units and the flak arm were also put to great use. However, even if the German fighters were able to inflict heavy losses ( the USAAF in particular lacked combat experience), they often appeared powerless against large forces of American heavy bombers that were dispatched to pound their airfields as well as troop concentrations. The Luftwaffe, confronted with sophisticated enemy equipment, was to find out the hard way what 'Materialschlacht' meant. As the months passed and Allied numerical superiority increased, fatal blows were dealt to the air and sea supply units, which isolated the Tunisian pocket. Despite the disproportionate nature of the fighting, the Axis were able to hold on to the country for some six months, although their positions were slowly  whittled away. And on 13 May 1943, after suffering heavy losses, the Axis lost Africa for good..."

 

Dornier Do 217 J Nachtjäger Paul Zorner - "Nächte im Bomberstrom" (296 Verlag)

Leading Nachtjagd ace Paul Zorner in his memoir " Nights in the Bomber Stream " (296 Verlag)  has some choice words for the Dornier Do 217 he flew in NJG 3 -  "ein Klotz" being one of the more polite terms he employs ( a 'brick' ). As he points out his loaded and tanked up Do 217 'fighter' weighed a "large truck heavier" than a fully loaded Junkers Ju 88 and climbed at all of 6 metres/second (IIRC) - at least half the rate of the Ju 88. 

 " Nächte im Bomberstrom " from 296 Verlag - 'Nights in the Bomber Stream'- is an excellent read.  Zorner writes engagingly and very frankly. One of his best 'reports' is his account of his third victory as a night fighter achieved on 19 February 1943 at the controls of a Do 217 - a "tired old cow" that took for ever to climb to altitude and was, as Zorner puts it, "exactly ten times heavier than a He 51 fighter". Zorner never liked the Do 217 - the idea that it could be used as a night fighter he found preposterous. Climbing out over the North Sea that night he was vectored towards a Wellington some twelve km north of the island of Norderney. Approaching the Wellington head on, the two aircraft banked into a 'turning fight' that lasted some twenty minutes as Zorner vainly sought to draw a bead on the British twin, hauling back with all his might on the stick in the turn, even getting the navigator to help him maintain his effort on the control column. In an attempt to achieve an outcome Zorner had to resort to desperate measures - giving the order to dump some 800 kg of fuel in order to lighten the Dornier. Putting in a superhuman effort on the stick he managed to loose off a brief burst which sent the Wellington down. There were no witnesses in the air - the downing was later confirmed by a flak battery. Zorner and crew then had to nurse their 'fighter' home on just one engine some 100m above the waves - a single round the size of a €1 coin had punctured an oil line.

  "...When we landed I went and saw the Kommandeur Lippe-Weissenfeld and told him exactly what I thought of the Do 217..."

Zorner never flew the aircraft again at night.

The penultimate chapter of Zorner's memoir covers the period from October 44 to May 45 as Kommandeur II./NJG 100, one of his last log entries being the flight into Novy Dvor on 15 October 44 at the controls of Ju 88 G-6 C9+HD. His Gruppe was in Hungary from October 44 before falling back to Wiener Neustadt in mid-March 1945.. Zorner states that

 '..what was left of the Gruppe II./NJG 100 had fallen back as far as they could go and most of our equipment and aircraft had been left behind..'

He describes his final successful sortie flown on the night of 5/6 March with four Ju 88s. With the Americans just kilometres from the field on 4 May 1945, orders came through for the Gruppe to fly to Prag-Gbell. Because of thick fog shrouding the field Zorner describes briefing his pilots on various plans of action - none of the twelve remaining pilots would be forced to make a Blindstart . In the end eleven aircraft managed to get airborne - including Zorner's W7+AC - reaching Prague on their last drops of fuel. Prague of course fell to the Russians. Zorner describes how on news of the capitulation on 9 May he and his men drove westwards to meet the Americans. As commanding officer the Americans would allow Zorner safe passage further westwards but not his men ..he therefore chose to stay with them, herded with thousands of German servicemen into an improvised field camp with no rations for a number of days. However at this point the US forces moved back allowing the Russians to take over the camp - the Russians then marched the officers back into eastern Germany and captivity...

All posts covering Luftwaffe memoirs on this blog -  which include in some instances rare translated accounts  - can be found at this link

https://falkeeins.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Luftwaffe%20memoirs

The leading publisher of Luftwaffe memoirs is 296 Verlag established by former Microsoft Germany honcho Kurt Braatz. See all my 296 Verlag blog posts at the following link

http://falkeeins.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/296%20Verlag

Flypast Meimberg article "The men behind the Bf 109"- an unusual 'kill', 24 September 1944

current issue of Flypast - nice cover. More Schwalbe Me 262 air-to-airs on this blog

http://falkeeins.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/new-build-me-262-schwalbe-air-to-airs.html

magazine contents include a small feature entitled 'Men behind the Bf 109' by Chris Goss who summarises the career of JG 2 ace Jule Meimberg. In his 'Britain at War' feature on Operation Sunrise as discussed elsewhere on this blog, Meimberg, according to his own account, ran out of fuel after downing three British bombers raiding the Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau on 24 July 1941. In the subsequent crash-landing he sustained injuries that put him out of the war for nearly a year. In this latest extract from Meimberg's memoir the pilot is now Kommandeur of II./JG 53 on the Western Front. He describes an unusual aerial "victory" over Germany on 24 September 1944. Here's my more extensive version of the piece. I have corrected some turns of phrase in the magazine feature and added some additional text;

" ...We received a visit from Generalleutnant Beppo Schmid, who held forth to the Gruppe's pilots on the possibility of shooting up the parachutes of bailed-out enemy pilots - an aviator was only really out of the fight when he was dead, so there was no good reason to let enemy pilots hang under their chutes. After he had departed I said a few words on the subject, weighing my words carefully, since Schmid's turn of phrase had left it unclear as to whether he was merely expressing an opinion, outlining an instruction or giving an order;

" Gentlemen, you've heard what Generalleutnant Schmid has to say on the subject. You know that Leutnant Paashaus was murdered a few weeks ago as he was hanging under his chute. I however have no intention of carrying out such an act..."

" Well, I won't hesitate.."  Herbert Rollwaage smirked back at me. He had always had a rebellious streak and would contradict me on principle.  I tried to make allowances for his provocative defiance. For many of us it had become incredibly difficult to continue to fight a 'clean' war that was becoming ever 'dirtier'. My own examination came on 24 September 1944. On this day the Gruppe was deployed against 'Jabos' in the area of Metz-Nancy. After the passage of a cold front Seeger and I were airborne at 12:27 with two Schwaerme. The Rhine glinted beneath us and through breaks in the cloud we could see Ludwigshafen. As usual my neck was on a swivel as I quartered the sky; there, ahead of us, standing out against a dazzlingly white wall of cloud - a tiny dot, slightly higher than us and on a parallel  heading. A twin-engined machine..strange..the shape of the wings resembled that of a Focke Wulf Fw 58..but the Weihe was a smaller aircraft. We turned in towards it. It appeared to be an aircraft type that I had never encountered before and seemed to be unarmed.  By now we were in close and suddenly - like an electric shock - I recognised the red-white-blue roundels on the wings and fuselage. An RAF machine! Had he lost his mind, flying over Germany in broad daylight like that  - and with no fighter escort? I pushed the throttle forward with the idea of getting him to follow me, but at that moment he must have spotted us as he banked into a turn towards the wall of cloud, clearly trying to evade our attentions. By now I was in behind him and aimed a short burst of fire at his starboard engine. It was not my intention to shoot him down and I therefore unleashed a short salvo from my MGs alone. I did not fire the 109's cannon armament. It was then that the enemy machine pulled up into a steep climb, rolled onto its back and plunged earthwards. It went down like a stone, and, as the enemy pilot attempted to pull out, the machine's structural limits were far exceeded. With a jerk one of the wings came away from the fuselage and fluttered down like a leaf, while the rest of the aircraft plummeted to the ground. There was no sign of any chutes from the body of the aircraft. We followed it down in steep spirals until it augered in. I didn't feel good about this at all. I gave the order to turn for home...Once we were back on the ground I was determined to see for myself what type of machine this was.. it was a military target, of that there was no doubt, so according to international law I had done nothing wrong..but there was something about this incident that didn't add up. I set out with my driver but after a few kilometres we got a puncture and had to stop to put on the spare wheel. But after a second flat we had to turn back. In the meantime news of this downing had come through to the Gefechtsstand - my 'victory' was an RAF Dakota, a transport type with 3 crew. On board were 20 passengers wearing khaki uniforms. The pilot had evidently drifted off course or got lost while on a flight south..I had killed 23 men - people who had left behind parents, loved ones, wives or even children.. it was to affect me deeply...I had seen too many die, written too many letters of condolence, come too close to death myself, to simply put thoughts of the consequences of this sortie out of my mind... "

Julius Meimberg's  memoir entitled 'Feindberührung'  is published by 296 Verlag
Unfortunately I have no news on a possible English-language edition. Click the label link below for more

Dornier Do 217 J Nachtjäger -Nachtjagd ace Paul Zorner memoir "Nächte im Bomberstrom" (296 Verlag)

Do 217 J equipped with FuG 212 Lichtenstein BC antenna array deployed in the Nachtagd role on Sicily 1942/43 with Englandblitz Wappen on offer here

Leading Nachtjagd ace Paul Zorner in his memoir "Nächte im Bomberstrom" (296 Verlag)  has some choice words for the Dornier Do 217 he flew in NJG 3 -  " ein Klotz " being one of the more polite terms he employs ( a 'brick' ). As he points out his loaded and tanked up Do 217 'fighter' weighed a "large truck heavier" than a fully loaded Junkers Ju 88 and climbed at all of 6 metres/second (IIRC) - at least half the rate of the Ju 88. He recalls a combat with an RAF Wellington during which he almost got shot down. After struggling home he went straight to his Kommandeur to tell him that he would never fly the 'old cow' in combat again!  According to Gebhard Aders, Dornier night-fighters achieved their last successes during August and October 1943 when they were - believe it or not - deployed on day light operations against USAAF B-17 bombers. Their fixed armament of 4 x MG151/20 cannon and 4 x MG17 machine guns furnished a certain amount of firepower in frontal attacks - if it could be brought to bear...

Operation Sunrise 24 July 1941 - I./JG 2 vs. RAF bombers over France (Britain at War magazine, April 2012 issue)

...Operation Sunrise was a large daylight raid mounted on 24 July 1941 against the German battle cruisers Prinz Eugen, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau holed up in the port of Brest. 'Sunrise I and II" - 'II' being the diversion - was flown by more than one hundred RAF medium and heavy bombers -  including Stirlings, Halifaxes..and three B-17 Flying Fortresses. Chris Goss has just published an excellent article detailing the events leading up to and including the 24 July 1941 raid entitled 'Neutralise the threat' which appears in the current issue of 'Britain at War' magazine.

Given the focus of 'Britain at War' Chris does not include any accounts from JG 2 pilots who countered the raid, although he does publish some interesting photos. 24 July 1941 was a significant day in the career of the Staffelführer 3./JG 2 Lt. Julius Meimberg - by his own account three bombers shot down and a crash landing that resulted in serious injuries that would keep him out of combat for the rest of the year.

While Goss states in one of his photo captions that Meimberg was shot down - presumably by the bombers' defensive fire - Meimberg's own account merely refers to running out of fuel. He had been performing an air test when he had simply run into the RAF raid ...

" ...In the early afternoon the chief engineer (Oberwerksmeister) reported that my Bf 109 E-7 'yellow 1' was serviceable and suggested that I take it up for an air test. So I took off alone. The visibility was perfect. With the sun beating down on my canopy, temperatures rose rapidly in the cockpit and I climbed for altitude in search of cooler conditions.."

 Banking in the direction of Brest, Meimberg could clearly see the silhouette of the Prinz Eugen in the port. The Gneisenau, on the other hand, was lying in a huge dry dock. They looked extremely vulnerable. Meimberg then flew a wide curving turn to the north-west and caught sight of a series of black dots moving to the south at between 4,000 and 5,000 metres altitude.

" Bomber ! They looked like swarms of insects, there was no doubt, however, they were bombers and there were several dozen of them ! I struggled to remain calm. I quartered the sky looking for the escort. However I see no sign of condensation trails that might betray any fighters - not a single Spitfire. As the bombers were flying into the sun, it was likely that I had not yet been seen. I called up our Gefechtsstand and told them the number, the altitude and the heading of the intruders. The first enemy aircraft passed below me at that moment...."

Meimberg feverishly switched on his sight and armed his MGs and dove down to come in behind a Handley-Page Hampden bomber.

" ..A long burst of fire ripped into his engines. He started to go down. I climbed back to altitude. After about ten minutes, I spotted another group of Hampdens and came down behind one of them. It wasn't long before he was joining my first victim. I again got back up sun in an 'ambush' position and, after a similar period, spotted my target: a Vickers Wellington. I came in from astern at full speed and opened fire, exhausting my last ammunition. It went straight down and crashed not giving any of its occupants a chance to escape. My third victory of the day! At that moment, the red low fuel warning light started flashing on the instrument panel. I'd been airborne for more than an hour and it was high time to land. Suddenly, while still a long way from Guipavas, my engine coughed and sputtered and then stopped abruptly..".

With his prop turned to fine pitch and still windmilling in the slipstream, the Staffelführer 3./JG 2 desperately sought out a landing strip before lining up on an open field in the vicinity of  Brélès. In the ensuing forced landing Meimberg's Bf 109 E -7 " yellow 1 ", displaying 10 victory bars, was brought to a stand after careening into a hedge and low wall. Severely damaged, the aircraft would be a write-off. In the photos taken immediately after the crash  Meimberg is prostrate on the ground, swathed in bandages, while German personnel and local civilians can be seen  attempting to protect the injured pilot from the heat of the sun’s rays with an umbrella. Meimberg would not rejoin his unit until spring 1942.

RAF losses during 'Sunrise' were considerable and the German ships relatively unscathed -  although the large bomber force was escorted by equally large numbers of fighters, the bombers could only be escorted part of the way due to the distances involved. I./JG 2 claimed some 25 RAF bombers shot down. Also successful were pilots of the Bf 109s of the Erg.Jagd training Staffel. Ofw. Franz Gawlik of this unit claimed a Halifax. The diversionary Circus mounted over northern France had failed to draw the Luftwaffe fighters north.


Further reading;

Eric Mombeek 'Dans le ciel de France'  (Vol II JG 2 history)
Jules Meimberg; chapter entitled "Gegen die Royal Air Force" in "Feindberuehrung" (296 Verlag)
Chris Goss " Neutralise the threat", article in Britain at War, April 2012 issue (general page view below)

new Luftwaffe books from 296 Verlag - Roderich Cescotti memoir "Langstreckenflug’ (Long distance flight)

 As the generation that fought WWII slowly passes, veterans continue to write and publish their memoirs and some of those who have largely remained silent up to now are finally setting down their accounts before the day of reckoning. 296 Verlag is one of those publishers still prepared to bring these memoirs to print. In the case of Roderich Cescotti this must have been an  easy decision.

"Chess", as he was known to friends and comrades, has some truly unique tales to tell. Having flown Heinkel He 111 bombers with KG 26 during the Battle of Britain, he ended the war as a Gruppenkommandeur in JG 301 flying the Focke Wulf Ta 152. In the years between he flew torpedo bombers against Artic convoys and long range reconnaissance sorties as far as the coasts of Greenland. In January 1943 he flew re-supply sorties into the besieged city of Stalingrad and was almost certainly one of the last pilots to drop supplies for the doomed 6. Armee. After this experience he was posted as Technischer Offizier to KG 100, and flew sorties with some of the first radio-guided anti-shipping missiles. He participated in bombing sorties against the Allied invasion fleet off the coast of Normandy at the controls of what he describes as the Luftwaffe's best pre-1945 bomber, the sleek and fast Dornier 217 M-11 and also flew the Luftwaffe's biggest - and some would say, least successful bomber - the Heinkel He 177. During the final months of WWII he was appointed Kommandeur of II./JG 301, and flew the fastest piston-engine fighter of the war - the Ta 152. Taken captive by the British, he trained as a translator and gained experience at the controls of British types such as the Mosquito. He was one of the first ex-Luftwaffe pilots to qualify post-war on jets for the new Bundesluftwaffe passing out at the Flugzeugführerschule B in Fürstenfeldbruck in 1956. In the early 60s he was appointed CO of AG Aufklärungsgeschwader 52 flying the Republic Thunderstreak and RF-104. He retired in 1980 with the rank of Generalmajor with some 4,000 hours and over thirty aircraft types in his logbook.

According to publisher Kurt Braatz, Cescotti's memoir is a no-holds-barred and vividly written tale of derring-do, featuring much first-hand detail of Battle of Britain operations, the maritime air-war and the defence of the Reich - names such as Steinhoff, Rall, Wolfgang Falck, Julius Meimberg and Walter Wolfrum feature throughout its pages.

You can read extracts from and even order Roderich Cescotti's memoir entitled "Langstreckenflug’ (Long distance or perhaps more colloquially 'long haul flight') now at http://www.neunundzwanzigsechs.de/

With the permission of the publisher I have translated an extract from "Langstreckenflug" here

Günther Josten's Gefechtsbericht - new from 296 Verlag - Günther Josten's War diaries

Günther Josten's remarkable wartime service with JG 51 is the subject of this latest volume from Kurt Braatz at Verlag/'Edition' 296. A large extract from the book is published in the November 2011 issue of  Flugzeug Classic magazine (cover llustration above). Assigned at the end of August 1942 to 3./JG 51 on the Eastern front Josten kept a diary both of his combat actions and his front-line Luftwaffe service, which 296 have published essentially in un-edited form with only a brief commentary introducing each chapter of his career. Josten's 'scoring' run began during the Kursk offensive in the summer of 1943. On 10 July 1943 he made claims 8 to 10. Three days later on 13 July he shot down five Il-2 Sturmoviks for victories 12 to 16. In total he claimed 19 victories in July and 30 in August 1943 to begin a remarkable run that saw him achieve some 178 victories over 420 combat sorties without ever being shot down himself. The war ended for Josten as Gruppenkommandeur of IV./JG 51 - his last seven aerial victories being claimed on 25 April 1945 - by which time he has filled no fewer than ten diary volumes and five photo albums, a fantastic legacy that Kurt Braatz has fully exploited in this new work.  His brother, Reinhard Josten, also served in Jagdgeschwader 51 and was killed in action on 21 April 1942.

Günther Josten: Gefechtsbericht. Kriegstagebücher 1939-1945. Kommodore in der Starfighter-Krise.  330 pages , 101 mostly unseen photos

For Luftwaffe blog readers a small extract translated from 296's Leserprobe

 " 08 July 1943. Oskar brought down several Russians on the early morning sortie flown with the boss. I had the same luck as yesterday - playing 'hide-and-seek' with eight LaGGs in the cloud deck. Sometimes they'd stick their noses out from their cover but when I tried a firing pass they'd quickly pop back in again. I blazed away but it drove me crazy. Nothing doing - no luck whatsoever. All the others got Il-2s or fighters which they were able to bring down without so much as a dog fight! It makes me sick !!  I flew the last sortie of the day with Lt. Höfemeier " ohne Feindberührung " - no contact with the enemy. We flew low over the battle field and could observe the fighting that was raging.. huge numbers of tanks slugging it out as if in a giant arena. As the light was fading we could see every hit on target quite clearly. On the horizon batteries of  'Stalinorgel' (rocket launchers) could be seen unleashing salvo after salvo. Super to watch - ganz toll.....
09 July ; I'm woken again early by aircraft low over the field waggling their wings ! A lot of victories again. Well, my turn tomorrow, I'm flying the early sortie in the morning..as it is I fly the second mission of the day. As soon as we get airborne we hear that there's a lot of aggro going on over the southern sector but by the time we get there, there's nothing to see. Not a single Russian. At this rate I shall soon depair. At midday I'm up again with Oskar  and he manages two Zement bomber.  I could p...!...but I'm happy enough anyway as Lt. Brendel manages his 50th and we have now achieved 400 in the Staffel with the 'kill' returned by Ofw. Kossatz. This afternoon I was up again, this time flying with the 'boss' and hoping to have more luck with him..we spot six MiG 3s but no sooner have they sighted us than they high tail it for home..!
At 20:15 Fw. Moritz Franke's Ferntrauung (marriage by proxy). Very nice. The Kommodore is with us for the rest of the evening's festivities.  Moritz and Piepel are awarded the EK II and the combat clasp in bronze  (bronzene Frontflugspange). I get the silver combat clasp for sixty sorties. Well, a bit of a consolation prize for my run of bad luck you could say .."

'Feindberührung' - Julius Meimberg memoir published by 296 Verlag

On 12 May 1944 the US 8th Air Force dispatched hundreds of B-17s and B-24s- screened by long range escort fighters - to petro-chemical targets in central Germany. One unit that rose to meet this awesome array of strength was II. Gruppe of JG 53 commanded by Julius Meimberg. Aged twenty seven years old, he had seen service in France and Africa with JG 2 and was now responsible for some eight hundred men in the defence of the Reich, knowing already that the war was lost. His vividly written memoir 'Feindberührung' - Contact with the Enemy - opens with a description of his bail out that day. Scrambled from Eschborn at 11:30, Meimberg's Schwarm had sighted Mustangs glinting in the sunlight at lower altitude and swept down on the bounce. Opening up with the engine mounted cannon, Meimberg was quickly in trouble - a defective 30mm round suddenly exploded in his weapon..The following translated extract nicely captures the drama of Meimburg's vivid account..


" ......Get out! Out! OUT! Oh my God - get out! Quick!

While reason is still fighting the rising panic, my hands start to dart around the cockpit in a well-rehearsed ballet of actions...

My left hand pulls the throttle lever back to idle and with a jerk I disconnect the cable that runs to the flight helmet from the radio set. My right hand releases its grip from the stick and starts to grope for the clasp of the harness. Even as I'm doing this the aircraft has already started to fall away in an uncontrollable dive.

I do not want to get roasted as happened last year over Tunis.

The push-in buckle of the clasp has to be open before the negative acceleration of the plummeting fighter in its final dive pins me so tightly into my straps that it will impossible to release it. It has to be undone before I release the canopy - the force of the slipstream will whip and lash my body so powerfully that the belt lock will block.

With both hands I fumble around on the safety catch.

Done! My left hand flies up to the emergency canopy- jettison lever but the hood sits tight; both hands grab the lever which opens the canopy normally and and start to wind it furiously but the hood remains closed. I can feel the panic rising again, choking. The explosion must have bent something; some ridiculously small part, a peg, a locking mechanism, a linkage or a drill hole.

Through the black film of oil that the shot-up engine is spraying onto the plexiglass wind shield, I can see bight red flames streaming back along the fuselage. My 109 is on fire. Feet drawn up onto the seat already, I arch my back against the canopy hood desperately. The Messerschmitt continues its headlong plunge to earth - now no more than a blazing torch.

There-finally: a crack! A tiny opening! Any hope of being able to escape the deadly trap imparts almost superhuman strength.

A bang, the brute punch of the airflow against head and chest - I am free...right hand groping for the handle for the ripcord, I whirl down through the skies. As soon as I open my eyes, I see a grey-green expanse above me and deep blue at my feet. Strange how you always fall head first. I have to resist the urge to pull the ripcord now. This would be very dangerous: far too many comrades have been machine-gunned while hanging in their chutes recently. Discernable details come into focus in the grey-green mass above me - here a village, surrounded by fields of rape oil seed blossoming brightly, there a small forest. Now, country roads and gravel paths come into view.

No, don't pull it yet.

I've at least 500 or 600 more metres to fall - that would be two -much too - long, dangerous minutes hanging under the open chute. But very quickly the red-white area of the village resolves into individual houses and the light- and dark grey of the wood develops into conifers and broad-leafed trees.

Now!

One last moment of terror - I hold the ripcord handle with its short wire in my hand and think that it has been torn off – but then - just at that instant - the jolt of the chute as it billows out behind me brakes my descent and I float downwards, envelopped by the tender smell of Spring.

My jump ends on a slope full of fresh green. Suddenly the roar of the engines of the three American P-51 Mustangs - appearing out of nowhere they sweep over my landing site without attacking - resonates as a dramatic final chord.

And then - silence. This redeeming silence which talks even more vividly not letting you hear any sound at all.

I will be here forever, it says; behind the thunder of your engines, the hammering of your guns, the rattling inferno of your orders and your death-cries in the earphones, I will await you, timeless and indifferently. Your war – your war does not touch me …

In front of me a pair of rabbit ears pops up in a furrow. I do not move. Flat on my belly, my head raised, I listen into this silence. A hare stretches,bobs up for a few seconds and then jumps away without any hurry.

With a deep breath, childish joy flows through me: joy for the Spring, the sun, the colours and the smells around me. I'm alive. Again, Still. And infinitely thankful.

A whirling sound drills itself into my ears and ends in a hollow banging and splintering sound. Over there - where just seconds before the hare was musing - the cabin hood of my plane smashed into the ground.

I pull myself together and head towards it - the canopy is scorched, charred, bent, shattered and covered with a raw, blinding coat of boiling oil.

“Hands up !”  I hear the voice behind me as -with shaking hands- I'm still trying to clean a fragment of the hood for safekeeping...the villagers are here, lead by a man who is being pulled by a barking mutt that looks very aggressive. No, I have to disappoint them. All they have before them is a German airman. A German fighter pilot, brought down by his own machine five minutes ago.

That must have been how it happened, I think to myself, while we are trotting towards their village; There is no other reasonable explanation for this turn of events. We were climbing, when I saw something flashing to the right below me- the glinting of sunlight on the aluminium body of an enemy aircraft, a glittering spot above the Taunus hills - still more flashing spots were swarming eastwards, weaving and bobbing. The American fighter sweep is below us, we are up at 5000 metres and have the sun in our backs. The ideal position to attack.... "

'Feindberührung' is published by 296 Verlag. An English-language edition has been promised for some time now. Unfortunately I have no news on its possible appearance. Elsewhere Meimberg contributes extensively to Erik Mombeek's history of JG 2 (two volumes published in French, one in English - translator Neil Page)

More Meimberg on this blog

http://falkeeins.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Jules%20Meimberg

Walter Krupinski bio from 296 Verlag

from the publisher's blurb

" ..with more crash landings, bail-outs and injuries than aerial victories, an easy-going Draufgaenger or "daredevil" both in combat and on the ground, Walter Krupinski was a hopeless case according to his CO Johannes Steinhoff. However under Günther Rall, he developed into one of Germany’s outstanding fighter leaders. “All I needed to succeed as a youngster, I’ve learned from this man”, said Erich Hartmann about his 23 year old superior. After three years in the east, Krupinski fought over the Reich and northern France. Alongside Adolf Galland, he scored the last of his 197 kills flying the Me 262 out of München-Riem with JV 44.

From 1946, Krupinski worked for the CIA to establish postwar Germany’s own secret service. Being retrained as a fighter pilot by the Royal Air Force, he became one of the key figures in forging the new Bundesluftwaffe. Krupinski was the first German to test-fly and recommend the F-104, and the first to lead a German fighter-bomber wing equipped with nuclear weapons at the height of the cold war. Being appointed the armed force’s youngest General in 1966, he rose to deputy air chief. Adored by his men in war and peacetime, he was feared for his uncompromising and challenging clarity on the carpet floors of the Ministry of Defence until his dismissal in 1976. He died in 2000.

Now here is his biography: Walter Krupinski – Jagdflieger, Geheimagent, General. From Stalingrad, the Normandy beaches and the balls-out flying of the 50s and 60s to the previously undisclosed, nightmarish details of nuclear warfare, it reflects a life packed with drama, hardships, glory and passion.."