The ground fire is intense and continual. The visibility is poor and I’m convinced that much of it is not from the Tommies.

At about 1200, Berthold watches a group of Camels, four, perhaps five, diving and firing on our trenches and pill boxes at about 2-300 meters.

He allows them to continue with their work until they become completely split up and have spent most of their ammunition, then he chooses one and attacks.

At this low height, a single shot in a vital part of the machine will force it to land in our territory.

After recovering from the attack, we watch as the injured Camel continues to fly eastward in a straight line, evidently its controls were damaged. We followed it almost to Becelaere before it drives itself into the ground, bursting into flames.*

So, Berthold’s lucky streak continues. This makes his twenty-fifth.

*Lt. Walter Harvey Russell Gould, a twenty-four year old Canadian from Number 70 Squadron RFC, flying B. 2358, killed near Becelaere. Berthold’s 25th.

Back on the ground at Harlebeke, everyone’s machine has a good deal of damage from a number of encounters with the Tommies and ground fire.

Richard Runge has brought down his 6th enemy, a Camel.*


*Probably from Number 45 Squadron RFC, crashed east of Becelaere at 1115.

On their way back to Harlebeke, Seppl’s Kette attacked a group of bombers at low altitude and drove them back. Several of our airfields have been bombed today.


















TO BE CONTINUED MONDAY





NO POSTING TOMORROW

26 September 1917 Continued:



65



We’re only able to mount a small patrol for the evening at 1700.

Berthold leads myself, Seppl, Keller and Klein.

The activity at the battlefront is at least as heavy as before and the weather worse.

The artillery fire is tremendous and we’re buffeted about by the passage of the shells.

The feldgrauen appear to be making a counter-attack toward the racetrack in the center of the Polygonwald.

Over the fighting, all three of the other Jagdstaffeln of Jagdgruppe 7 are represented as well as several formations from the Richthofengeschwader.






Caption – This is my Albatros DV Uprated skin for Erich Just of Jasta 11 vs an SE5 from RFC-60 flown by Spencer B. Horn.



Caption - Albatros DV Uprated from Jasta 4 flown by Busso von Alvensleben vs an SE5 from RFC-60 flown by Robert Leslie Chidlaw-Roberts. Both are WOFF Skin Pack skins.




Caption – Albatros DIII skin for Max Wackwitz of Jasta 24 vs the WOFF generic SE5 skin for number 60 Squadron RFC.

I used these RFC-60 skins cause I like em and they were stationed in the area at this time. I believe these and all the other SE 5 and 5a skins were done by Sandbagger.

The Wackwitz skin is a conversion of OvStachel’s Albatros DIII, generic skin. It is from Pack 6 of More Skins by jerbear.

This heavy concentration of our aircraft drives off all the cockades over the fighting, giving our men below relief and allowing our working machines to operate unhindered.










Caption – Hans Böhning’s Albatros DV Uprated from Jasta 36 vs the Generic WOFF Nieuport 27 (Lewis) skin for #29 Squadron RFC.

Hans Böhning actually did shoot down a Nieuport 27 on 26 September over Geluvelt, B.3639 from Number 29 Squadron RFC.

The Böhning skin is from the User Skins by jerbear. pack 2.




Caption – This skin is from the Two-Seater Skins Mod by jerbear and was made for Otto Schober who is now in Jasta 18 with Carl Eber. The machine is still with the unit, flown by another pilot.

This is a Halberstadt made DFW from the first production batch. It is a speculative skin and has no historical connection with Schober

In the WOFF Campaign Schober flies this DFW for only a little over two months from around April to early June 1917.

Caption – This is the WOFF Skin Pack default for FAA 250s.



Caption – Another skin from the Two-Seater Skins by jerbear Mod. The skin was made for Justus Kaiser of Schusta 30b.

This arm and hammer marking belonged to Schlasta Y, according to “Schalchtflieger” by Rick Duiven and Dan Dan-San Abbot. WOFF used it for Schalsta 35, but this Schlasta is only equipped with Halberstadt CLIIs, which do not exist in the WOFF universe and possibly never will.

I took the marking for Kaiser and put him in an LVG built DFW. He flies it from 22 March to sometime in September 1917.

We have two encounters with the Tommies but they’re half-hearted and the Lords disengage quickly.




Caption – WOFF Skin Pack Camel skin for John W. Pinder RFC-45.

But Sigi Keller catches a Bristol trying to make his way home and brings him down. It’s hard to tell which side it came down on with all the confusion down there.

It’s dark when we come in to land,. The landing fires have been lit.











This evening we receive news that Obltn Jahns was killed on Sunday.







ENDE

66

Dienstag, 27 September 1917

Neuer tag.







This morning’s Patrouillenflüg was without even one sighting of an enemy machine.

The dull, low clouds persist, though they are somewhat higher now, perhaps 1,500 meters.

The British Flakartillerie is particularly accurate today so Berthold takes us up above the clouds into the sunshine several times. After we change direction and cover some distance, we descend again until the white bursts get too bothersome again.





Back at Harlebeke now, we are training again. Veltjens and Keller are doing mock combat.

Another of the new Pfalz machines has arrived and it’s my turn to try it out.

Berthold is quite taken with his, but he still hasn’t taken it on a combat patrol.

This one is painted silver, rather than the green and mauve camouflage I saw at Huele.

I see one thing right off that I don’t care for. The MGs are buried in the fuselage like the old Roland D models, inaccessible to the pilot. If a gun jams you’re out of luck.*

*This is the Pfalz DIII. The problem, along with some others, was corrected in the DIIIa.

We receive a little rain shower before I take the new bird up but it only lasts a few minutes.

“Well little silver bird, let us see what you can do.”

She comes off the ground quite nicely but she’s a little underpowered. She takes almost three minutes to reach 1,000 meters.

In level flight, the nose wants to rise quite persistently. Perhaps a little rigging work will help this, I’ll have to see. Except for this tendency to want to rise, she seems very stable, a good gun platform.

I have good all-around view except for straight ahead. I don’t feel quite as boxed in as with the SPAD but it’s still a problem.

I try her out at low speed and then with the power completely cut. She’s very sluggish and the nose wants to drop off to the right in a shallow dive. Not a brick, but not a glider either.

Taking her through several turns, I find that she can turn very tightly indeed. I think I could possibly out turn a Camel, but only as long as I can keep her speed up, which isn’t long, then she slips. She bleeds speed very quickly both turning and climbing.




Caption – this is OvStachel’s new Pfalz default skin which will not be available until these skins are completed and released in a future update.

You will note that the silver finish is much more metallic looking than they grayer look of the old skins.

It’s in a dive that I see her best traits. The airframe is very strong. Bender was quite correct when he said she would “dive like hell.”

I try several dives, progressively steeper and faster. I can nose her over, almost straight down, at voll gas, and there’s no vibration in the wings at all.

Wonderful after the nervous tension one always has with the Albatros DV.

She’s very easy to land as well, very smooth. I made a wheel landing with the skid only touching the ground when I was near the end of my run.

It’s definitely an attackers aeroplane, you won’t outrun anyone with it. But, despite her faults and lack of power, some of which I hope will be corrected in the next production batches, I like her very much and feel as though I’m being unfaithful to Beomia.

I hope we’ll be equipped with them, and I think we will if der Eiserne has anything to say about it.*

*The Pfalz began to arrive in Jasta 18 in October but they were not fully equipped with them until sometime in February 1918.

The WOFF Campaign gives the Pfalz to all pilots, except a few lower rank wingmen, on 10 October 1917. The story will diverge from this and follow a more historical, mixed makeup of the Staffel, increasing the use of the Albatros DV and adding in a few Pfalz until February.



Der Meister’s Camel of yesterday has been confirmed. He has his SPAD from Friday which is still not determined but we call this his 25th.

So, a celebration is in order.

While he’s busy with paperwork, we pilots, Bart, and Eiserne’s ground crew pretty up his Albatros.

The number 25 is painted in white paint on the spinner and we put a wreath of Oak leaves around it.

We have Spiess watching for us, so that we don’t interrupt any important business.

At his signal we burst into the office, Seppl at the head of the mob, picking him up bodily out of his chair, careful not to cause him too much pain.

We carry him out to the hangars to toast and cheer him, pushing schnapps into his hand.

I snap a good picture of him standing in front of his bird, with his Schwarzer Mann on either side.

He responds to our high spirits with good humor and enthusiasm and gives us an impromptu speech.

“ Among you, my blue birds, there are no pilots who would hesitate to shoot down an opponent in aerial combat and we have had great success.”

“This was not my doing, I have merely trained and properly led you against the opposition. Your splendid performance shows what a spirit there is in this entire Staffel and in each individual flyer.”

“When it said in the army orders a few days ago “The battle-tested Jasta 18,” it showed that people generally see what an important factor this Staffel, which once stood so far in the background, has become in this horrible struggle!”

More cheering, a few more toasts and we let him get back to the paperwork war.









ENDE