Storming The Bombers Vol.1 - Chronicle JG 4 - Luftwaffe - Mombeeck

Description: **PLEASE READ** I WILL PROVIDE A SHIPPING QUOTE IF YOU PURCHASE MULTIPLE ITEMS. PLEASE AWAIT MY COMBINED SHIPPING INVOICE FOR MULTIPLE ORDERS. IF YOU ONLY BUY ONE ITEM YOU CAN GO AHEAD AND PAY. REMEMBER - IT IS MORE ECONOMICAL TO BUY MULTIPLE PURCHASES AND PAY ONE POSTAGE COST -------------------------------------------------- Storming The Bombers: A Chronicle of JG 4 The Luftwaffe's 4th Fighter Wing - Volume 1: 1942-1944 - Eric Mombeeck SCARCE SUPERB book by well know aviation historian, Erik Mombeeck - an English translation of the original French edition - self published by the author. Huge amounts of research went into this book, which is clearly a labour of love. As far as I know, there were two volumes in this series. Profusely illustrated throughout, both with aircraft & photos of staff and pilots - a really beautiful book and one which will definitely fit well into your Luftwaffe library. Here's the official product info: The fourth fighter wing of the Luftwaffe was initially established during 1942 and committed to operations in defence of the Rumanian oil fields during 1943. I./JG 4 first saw action in combat against a strike force of B-24 Liberators dispatched on the celebrated low level attack against Ploiesti on 1 August 1943, Operation "Tidal Wave". JG 4 was subsequently deployed in the bitterly fought German defensive campaign on the Italian peninsula during the first half of 1944, prior to being shifted to the Normandy invasion front and then falling back to the frontiers of the Reich in September that year. It was during the summer of 1944 that JG 4 underwent considerable reinforcement with two new Gruppen swelling its ranks. The most effective of these was II. (Sturm)/JG 4, a so-called "Storm" or "assault" wing, built up around a hard core of former Sturmstaffel 1 pilots and an intake of young daredevil volunteers. Committed against the massive USAF bomber fleets pounding the Reich, these German "kamikaze" fighters, as some saw them, were deployed to bring down the American bombers by any means, including ramming if necessary. Despite the appalling losses sustained by JG 4 during WW II, the author managed to locate around one hundred JG 4 and Sturmstaffel 1 veterans and their personal accounts and photographs bring this history vividly to life and imbue it with a human dimension which many will find moving. The first volume of this two part history covers the unit's establishment, deployments and combat actions through to Autumn 1944, providing for the first time in English a day-by-day, mission-by-mission study of the Luftwaffe's 4th fighter wing. And here's a review from an Amazon customer (2010) who gave the book 5 out of 5 - the words are NOT my own and are used for descriptive purposes only: From its humble beginnings as an almost accidental staffel to its decimation in the waning days of 1944, Volume 1 of this history of Jagdgeschwader 4 (JG 4) provides a microcosm of the use and abuse of the Luftwaffe's fighter arm. In the hands of noted Belgian historian Erik Mombeeck, the story of this seldom-noted gruppe is told though the poignant personal stories of the unit's few survivors. The origins of JG4 can be traced to a handful of pilots from another unit, JG 77, who were on a transit flight from the Soviet front to the Mediterranean in mid-1942. While resting on a field near Ploiesti, Romania, their 6 Bf 109's were the only German unit positioned to defend the region when the HALPRO force made the surprise first U.S.A.A.F. attack on the storied oilfields there. First designated as the Oil Protection Staffel, the unit was soon officially established as the First Gruppe of the new JG 4 (I./JG 4). The gruppe was slowly brought up to full strength, with the typical 3 staffeln and an additional 4th staffel comprised of Romanian pilots. The next year is remembered by the unit's personnel as a pleasant interlude, with only an occasional "alarmstart" interrupting their otherwise peaceful days of swimming, eating, and training, with "few indications that there was a war on." But even now, the weakness of the Luftwaffe's training program was showing: Senior pilots even had to teach the novice pilots "when to correctly deploy their landing gear and touch down safely!" This near idyllic existence was shattered on August 1, 1943, by the appearance of B-24's flying the famous low-level Operation Tidal Wave against the oil refineries of Ploiesti. Despite their lack of experience, the pilots of I./JG 4 acquit themselves well, accounting for 8 of our raiders. By the time the gruppe transferred to Italy in December, it had atypically at this point in the war flown only one true combat sortie. In an example of Luftwaffe units being used as a "fire brigade", the relatively inexperienced pilots were thrown into Italy in anticipation of an additional invasion and to bolster already-bloodied units. The reality of the war soon hit home, when in Italy the unit's men came into immediate contact with the pilots of JG 77, following their retreats from North Africa, Sicily, and southern Italy. Kurt Leopold recalls: "...they were bitter--both physically and mentally exhausted--at the end of their tether. If what we heard was to believed, we were in for some very difficult times." And a rough time it was. According to an excellent appendix on losses, during their participation in the Italian campaign, I./JG 4 lost 40 men killed or missing, 26 wounded, and 7 taken prisoner. Given that a 3-staffel group would have had a complement of between 36 to 48 pilots, this is a horrendous loss rate. The war was brought home in another way. While transferring from Romania, many of the men were granted home leave, where the toll of the Allied bombing was showing. Leopold experienced the RAF raid on Frankfurt on 20/21 December 1943, and notes, "It would later take us virtually half a day to cross the city and reach the airfield--the journey had taken just 15 minutes the previous day." As pressure increased on all fronts, the gruppe would soon be transferred yet again, in response to the D-Day invasion and to participate in the defence of the Reich. At this point in his narrative, the author devotes an important chapter to the story of the development of the sturm tactic--the use of very large formations consisting of heavily armouried Fw 190's covered and assisted by Bf 109's to make co-ordinated attacks on the bombers. Initially approved by Adolph Galland, the tactic was successful enough to be expanded to the rest of the fighter force. This part of the book is essentially a recapitulation of an earlier book on Sturmstaffel 1, and it is from this point the book really hits its stride. Following the D-Day invasion, JG4 was rapidly expanded by two more gruppen, with II./JG4 designated as the Sturmgruppe. Such was the state of the Luftwaffe's personnel needs at this point, that most pilots were drawn from heavy fighter, glider, bomber, and even transport pilots. One captain, with at least a small amount of single-engine fighter experience, was given command of a staffel, despite a head injury which left him disoriented to the point that he had to have others command the formation when it entered cloud. The new units had little more than a few weeks to work up to combat status before being joining the "fire brigades". The "older brother", I./JG4 stayed active, first during the tour in Italy, and finally, transferred to the Western Front. In Italy, despite high losses, which even included attacks by partisans, the unit gained valuable experience fighting bombers, and scored some surprising successes. Transferred back to the Reich for the addition of the standard fourth staffel, much of August was spent in training and blending in the flow of new pilots. Best described as barely-ordered chaos, this period saw numerous losses during training accidents. The first-person observations of new pilots coming into the gruppe provide an unusual glimpse into the minds of young men as they enter into a highly dangerous situation, but with a sense of duty and anticipation. During this time, movements, whether by ground or air, were exceptionally dangerous. Flying accidents killed or injured not only new pilots, but experienced and hard-to-replace commanders. Ground trips were subject attacks by the Resistance, causing serious casualties on at least one occasion. Nothing better illustrates the situation for German pilots at this stage of the war, than the gruppe's transfer to France. Arriving at their airfield late one evening, the pilots were told to stay near their aircraft the next morning, and to make preparations to blow up their aircraft and "bug out" by truck in the likely event nearby Allied forces appeared. The morning of the next day, the unit managed to get airborne and transferred to a field in Belgium. Upon landing, they were immediately beset by P-47's which destroyed 6 of their number. The remaining 109's topped off their tanks and flew post-haste to a field near Antwerp, where they were grounded for 6 days due to a lack of fuel. The rest of the tale is one of slow decline against the background of steady stress. Because of Allied air supremacy. The Luftwaffe's fighter arm was driven into forested revetments in an often vain attempt to elude roving American and British fighters. In one account, a pilot describes how they disguised their grass field by placing cut-outs of Frisian cows on the take-off areas, hoping to fool any possible attackers. (To realise the relative strengths of the combatants, contrast this with Patton's pre-invasion "fake army" across from the Pas de Calais.) Throughout the retreat from the West to final duty in defence of the Reich, the accounts paint a portrait of the inexorable grinding down of the German fighter arm. Again, first-person accounts vividly tell what it was like to try to penetrate fighter screens and get to the bombers, usually a futile, often fatal effort. By this stage of the war, losses were constant, with even experienced commanders overwhelmed or just worn out--a long ways from the restful days in 1943 Romania. Ample well-captioned photographs add to the narrative and provide visual evidence of the strain of combat day-to-day against overwhelming forces. The photos are well laid out, and in many cases are half a page in size, making detail strikingly evident. In a particularly telling photo, a young Lt. Linck stands, arm in sling, dark circles under his eyes, after surviving a collision with his wing man in the middle of an attack on B-17's. Most of the photos, gathered by the author over years of research are published here in an English volume for the first time. The author provides excellent context in chapter introductions (the "Oil Fields of Ploiesti is an outstanding short summary of the early war in the Balkans), but then stands back and lets the veterans tell their stories. Contemporaneous letters add to the narrative, exploring the experiences and motivations of those involved. Three appendices, with maps and victory and loss lists, keyed to each chapter, add to the books research value. All in all, this is a a superb, attractive book preserving important stories from one of the Luftwaffe's lesser-known units. I look forward to the completion of the story in Volume 2. 242 page hardcover published 2009 WEIGHT - 1.24 kg -------------------------------------------------- SHIPPING:UK Details are provided in the drop down menu below. Items below 2kg will be sent by Royal Mail, over 2kg by courier. SHIPPING: OVERSEAS ITEMS WORTH LESS THAN €150 / £135 From 1 July 2021, the Brexit transition period ends. 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Price: 120 GBP

Location: York

End Time: 2024-04-19T13:14:29.000Z

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