Saturday 25 June 2016

late-war Bf 109 G-14 and Fw 190 or the dangers of presenting guesswork as fact - daily ebay photo find #184



...late-war Luftwaffe subjects can be difficult enough without the confusion that results from  'guesswork' being presented as fact! 


Above;  since appearing in a recent ebay auction this machine has been labelled as a G-14 of the " Stab/JG 4 at Zellhausen.."

Very very doubtful. There is not one single mention of  'Zellhausen' in Erik Mombeek's two volume history of JG 4! In fact the only fighter Gruppe that saw action here was II./JG 11 early in 1945. Located in Hesse, east-south-east of Frankfurt/Main, in 1945 Zellhausen was home to TGr. 30 operating He 111s in the transport role flying resupply missions to the German fortress enclaves in western France as well as to Dunkirk on the Channel coast. Besides the 'dark' coloured fuselage band doesn't look black (as JG 4's fuselage bands were..) certainly not compared to the black of the 'chevron'. (Thank you John)

Below, from the same seller, a II./JG 53 G-14 with solid black fuselage band and labelled by the same poster " ....at an unknown location "  (!).  But note how the GI in the cockpit is the same man in both images!


..and below; another image from the same seller depicting the same GI again! This machine has been labelled " Bf 109 G-6 or G-14 W.Nr. unknown, I./JG 101, Bad Wörishofen, late April 1945 " ....

So counting 'an unknown location' as a potential third airfield, we see photos of the same GI on three different airfields posing with aircraft from three different units. I don't really think that is very likely to be honest.. in my opinion we're looking at a late-war unit who painted their aircraft with a triple fuselage band and shared a field towards the end with JG 53 - narrows the field down quite a bit...



Abandoned Fw 190s photographed in Mourmelon, France by members of the 406th FG here


May, 1945, burnt-out Heinkel He 219, Handorf