Feldgrau.net

Here is a partial list of her officers: Kapitän zur See Bernhard Rogge Captain Leutnant zur See Dr. Ulrich Mohr Adjutant Kapitänleutnant zur See Erich Kühn First Offizier Kapitänleutnant zur See Paul Kamenz Navigator Oberleutnant Lorenz Kasch Gunnery Officer Oberleutnant zur See Adolph Wenzel Radio ...

Under the terms of Lend-Lease, the items had to be returned when the war was over if they had not been expended ("stricken" in USN parlance). Any cost was for use - and the cost was not increased or decreased by an items return. HMS Cambeltown was "expended" and thus was not requ...

Phylo et al; Most certainly both the Skuas and Swordfish from Ark Royal launched a number of bombing attacks both on targets around Narvik in May and the landing sites for the foray to take Trondheim in April. The Swordfish did not make any bombing attacks on shipping though. The Swordfish of 810 &a...

Andy; I don't doubt the RAF had a bomb larger than 500 pounds - but I don't think the FAA did at that time anyway. The Skua was limited to a 500 pounder plus some 20 pounders. The Swordfish could carry at 2,000 pounds of bombs, but during the Norwegian campaign the largest bomb carried by any Ark ai...

Gentleman; I am trying to find any information about five Fw-200s lost and three damaged on perations in the area of three specific Gibraltar convoys. All were claimed by FAA fighter pilots of 802 Squadron operating for HMS Audacity. 1. OG74: Fw-200 destroyed on 21.09.41 (another a/c was claimed dam...

Gents; The only ship to carry a mixed catapult flight on board was HMS Neptune, and only briefly in September 1939. The ship was the only one assigned aircraft from 716 Flight when the war began, and was nominally assigned two Seafox float-planes. She was on South Atlantic station when the war began...

The answer to this question depends greatly on what the person that made it really means. Contrary to the statement made immediately above, Royal Navy Catapult Flights/Squadrons were almost always composed of different aircraft types. From the "reclaiming" of the FAA to become the RN Air B...

It is not at all correct to say that "they" tried the exact same thing in the June attack on the battleship Scharnhorst in Trondheim. Although the Air Staff on HMS Ark Royal was very aware that the significant differences between the highly successful April mission and that currently being...

Gentleman; I wrote an extensive answer to this question on another forum. Simply put, neither the Kriegsmarine nor the Luftwaffe sent highly trained aircrew on suicide missions. Throughout the entire period of the Bismarck hunt, the sea state was such that no seaplane could conduct water takeoffs or...

Nick;

If you contact me off forum at <[email protected]> i can give you an excellent summary and OB material from Finish, German, and Russian source material.

Mark

I thought the following synopsis of Skua operations in Norway, especially those from the air station at Hatston, might be of interest. Despite steady expansion since September 1939, by the time Norway was invaded the Fleet Air Arm consisted of but twenty first-line squadrons, fourteen Torpedo-Spotte...

Gentleman; The original specification that ultimately resulted in the Blackburn Skua, O.27/34, was issued on 12 December 1934 called for a Fighter-Dive Bomber (FDB) to replace the Hawker Osprey bi-plane in fleet service. It NEVER, at any pint, called for any torpedo carrying ability. In fact, since ...

Ron; Rosolino Pilo, a 8,36 BRT motor-ship, was virtually brand new, having been completed in the early summer. After loading at Napoli, she sailed for Tripoli from Trapani on 17 August at 0630, escorted by the destroyers Maestrale (flag) and Gioberti. Sighted by reconnaissance aircraft, FL Donald Ch...

Ron; In a post below you provided a great deal of information about the 30 Lg.s.F.H. 13 (Sfl.) auf Lorraine-Schlepper assigned to the Afrika Korps in 1942. In it, you noted that seven were lost at sea: a batches of three lost in July, and a batch of four lost in August. One of my other areas of inte...

I wonder if anyone has the information about the organization of the three Gebirgsjaeger Regiments (136, 137, 138) and the two Gebirgsartillerie Regiments (111, 112) operating in Northern Finland as part of these two divisions. 1. Were the regiments operating battalions with five companies (three ri...