Well, I’m not sure how much of this will get past the military censor, but you asked me to tell you everything, so that’s what I am going to do. I trust they will not see a nephew’s letters to his seventy year old mother as a grave threat to the security of the Reich!
Finally we are settled in Calais. Poland seems a long time ago and since then I didn’t see much action as every time we relocated to a new airfield the front line had leapfrogged us and we had to move again! It was great seeing you in Koln, sorry we had to move so soon! (I blame the French for not holding out longer.) We are not StG 51 anymore. If you are writing now, please address mail to Sturzkampfgeschwader 1, Luftflotte II. Gruppe Keil. That will reach me.
As you know my pilot from the StG 51 days was hit in the leg over Radom and is now in Berlin shuffling papers, so I have a new pilot. His name is Hptm Hein and he is a lunatic. Mutti, I am not so certain I will survive this man.
I will tell you about today, and you will understand. Today was the first day of our operations over the Channel and we were ship hunting. Hein leads the flight, under our squadron leader Major Paul Werner Hozzel. (His nickname of course, is Schnozzel, because of his profoundly impressive nose.) If we would just follow the others, we would be fine, but this is not Hein’s way.
We were 7 that took off at 0700 and we met up with five 109 fighters over the coast abut two minutes later. We sighted some ships in a convoy at 0745 and at that exact time, the escort called “Indianer!” off our port side and peeled away to attack them. Our flight started the bombing run and my new pilot Hein got the chance to show me his stuff for the first time.
This is what he is supposed to do: . The pilot finds his target and begins diving. Dive brakes open, this automatically noses the aircraft over into a dive. Red tabs protrude from the upper surfaces of the wing as a visual indicator to the pilot : at the same time the automatic dive recovery system is actuated. The pilot aims the entire aircraft at his target using a simple gun-type sight.
2. The Stuka dives at an angle between 60-90 degrees and accelerates to 600km/h. It should hold this speed with the help of the dive-brakes located on the wing, but this inevitably puts a lot of stress on the structure.
3. When the aircraft is reasonably close to the target, a light on the contact altimeter comes on to indicate the bomb-release point-usually at a minimum hight of 450m. The pilot releases the bomb by depressing a knob on the control column to release weapons and to initiate the automatic pull-out mechanism. A clutch located under the fuselage would swing the bomb out of the way of the propellor, and it also starts pulling the plane up automatically incase the pilot have become unconscious.
4. Pullout mechanism is activated and the airplane automatically initiates a 6g pullout, returning elevator trim tabs to normal position. Can be overridden by the pilot in emergency. Once nose is above horizon, dive brakes retract, throttle opens and air screw is set to climb. The pilot regains consciousness and control, and resumes normal flight. He use his remaining bombs under the wings for other targets.
Well, I say that is what is supposed to happen, and what the others do. Hein keeps flying straight and level.
“What are you doing Hauptmann?” I ask him.
“Just being certain Fritz,” he says. “Ah, a nice fat freighter”.
I can’t see what he is talking about, so he must be looking through the floor panel at a ship directly below us. Then, without warning, he rolls our aircraft on its back and throws us into a vertical dive! I am looking straight up at the sky, and my breakfast ends all over the handgrip on my machine gun. My own screaming is drowned out by the screaming of our siren. I hear the bomb release and the aircraft begins a high G escape, my vision goes red, my head pounds and I pass out.
When I wake, we are pointed back at France. There are no other aircraft, friend or foe, to be seen. In the distance, I see the smoke of burning ships. I gag, and the Hptmn says “Good morning Fritz, did you have a nice nap?” That was our first sortie. But not the last that day.
If possible, the next, was worse.
After we landed I learned that we only scratched the convoy, three ships damaged, and that it was continuing through the Channel. We were ordered to refuel, rearm, and attack it again – only this time we could be certain it would be better protected by the Tommies.
Hein was humming to himself as he walked around the machine. As I cleaned my breakfast out of my cockpit, I can assure you I was not humming. “An interesting bombing technique you have Hauptmann,” I observed.
“Direct hit, every time Fritz, that is what matters,” he said. Yes, unless the wings snap off and we turn ourselves into a flying bomb.
We take off and again meet with our escort, which is 8 109s this time. It takes some time to locate the convoy again because of clouds but it announces itself when the flight in front of us starts taking flak. I hadn’t noticed any flak last time, so we must have surprised them. But they are ready for us now.
So is the RAF. I call a squadron of 12 Hurricanes closing from 3 o’clock and they flash straight past our comrades out front and come directly at us! The escort is too far in front to engage. The Hptmn calls the flight to attack the convoy.
“Hold onto your coffee Fritzy,” the Hptmn says and wings over, heading for the deck. I spray with my gun wildly in the direction of the fighters closing on us but with the aircraft rolling and banking all I hit is clouds.
“Still with me?” Hein calls as he levels the aircraft about 100 meters above the ocean.
“Not going anywhere, Hauptmann,” I reply truthfully. Except, maybe, hell.
The convoy is now off our port side about 1 kilometre, and two RAF fighters have followed us down to the water level and are swinging around behind us, but they are not in a position to attack yet. Reason would dictate we dump our bomb, ram the throttle forward and head for France, hoping the Tommies would stay with their convoy to protect it.
Hein turns toward the convoy instead.
“Hauptmann! I have fighters at 4 o’clock!”
“And I have an enemy destroyer at 12 o’clock Fritz. Keep them busy.”
I can hear the thump of the destroyer’s guns as it fires at our comrades, but none of the flak, thankfully, seems directed at us. I cannot imagine what Hein is thinking, as he approaches the target like we are a torpedo plane, skimming along the water at 200 kilometres an hour. I bang away at the Tommies now closing on our tail, both vying to be the one to kill us.
About 200 metres from the target he pulls up into a spiralling near vertical climb. The two Hurricanes are caught completely by surprise and flash past beneath me, unable to slow quickly enough. At the top of the climb the Hptmn kicks the rudder and we nose down again, pointed straight at the destroyer. Almost immediately he lets go of the bomb and hauls us into a turn, away from the destroyer, and the Hurricanes.
My head is plastered up against the glass of the cockpit but my eyes track the fall of the bomb as it lands a couple of metres away from the hull of the destroyer and sends a geyser of water a hundred metres into the air.
“Did we get it Fritz?” he calls.
“We might have broken some china in the officers mess Hauptmann, but otherwise…”
“Dammit! And where are those fighters?”
They have tangled with a 109, thank heavens. So Hein begins a tortuously slow climb away from the convoy as I scan the skies desperately for Hurricanes. We don’t speak at all on the way home. What is there to say?
When we land, Mutti, I learn that we are only 4 of 8 who made it home.
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