I have a book that mentions several of his aircraft that I will try to look at later, and also after the war, the man went on to become the commanding general of all Nato air forces in Europe for several more years.
No decals can be found on my part either.
You’d likely either have to obtain his autobiography, or a book devoted solely to JG52 history to find something with more meat on the subject. Google searches are very frustrating with just a short paragraph or even a lone sentence describing him or his unit during this period in question. I did find this written interview in which he does give several clues that he did participate in that campaign.
The easiest marking would likely be an aircraft coded with a black ‘1’ when he was made the leader of 8./JG52 on July 25th,1940. Though without photo proof, this isn’t a 100% certainty.
For what he was flying before his promotion, I can only extrapolate based on artist’s works. There is this painting of his supposed aircraft during the battle of France. Looks to be a white 4 with the squiggly III gruppen symbol, which would place him with 7th staffel.
There is also this b/w drawing titled as ‘Bf109Es of JG52 flown by Gunther Rall during the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940.’ Assuming the fuselage numbers are white, this would place him with 1st staffel, as there is no gruppen symbol.
Note, that both these artworks do contain Rall’s signature. Whether this means he approves the authenticity of the research, or was simply helping to promote the artists - I’ve no clue. If anyone can confirm more, that would be great.
regards,
Jack
Wow! Thank you Jack.
That is fantastic information. I’ll continue to do some research and probably find a book on the JG 52. Maybe I’ll need to do some “decal bashing” to come up with the right markings, or attempt to paint/make my own.
Steve
I just checked the Osprey books on JG 52 and their one on 109D/E aces 1939/41 and there’s no mention of Rall in either.
Eagle was talking about doing one of his aircraft as Rall once gave a talk to Eagles unit when he was stationed in Germany. But he has a G-2 and I could find anything on one of those either.
Dang!
Odd thing is, he was made Staffelkapitan of 8/JG 52 in June 1940, so I would have thought there would be at least one image of his plane.
There’s got to be something somewhere adout his E. I can find stuff on his G, at least I think it’s correct. I certainly don’t know as much about it as you guys.
JG52 as whole, had a rough time during the summer of 1940, so maybe not too much to celebrate with photo ops.
I’ve found this bit of detailed history of the unit, but is in German:
http://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/Gliederungen/Jagdgeschwader/JG52.htm
From what google translates, III group (which contains 7th, 8th and 9th staffels) showed only ten victories during the Western campaign, being located on the front from June 9-13, 1940, before being pulled back inside Germany.
July 22nd, they returned to the front, stationing at Coquelles. July 30, again pulled back after only four victories, while they themselves lost seven and one captured. That seems to be it, and looking at the list of 8th staffel airfields, they never returned to the channel front.
This photo is interesting, though it’s of Rall’s 109F-4 shot down on the eastern front, November 28th, 1941. It does support the theory of his Emil being coded with a black one when stationed in Coquelles, France. Note the gruppe emblem forward of the cockpit, I’m not sure if it was used in 1940.
regards,
Jack
Man there’s some good research going on in here![Y][Y][Y]
The 1/32 Trumpeter G-2 comes with Rall’s ‘Black 2’ scheme. He also wrote a book called “my logbook”. I looked into getting it a while back but it is extremely expensive and hard to find. One thing about him is none of his planes, that I’ve seen, were anything but modestly marked. I wonder how many folks rode down in chutes wondering “who was that”?
That’s for sure! No tulips on that plane! lol
About 2 yrs ago I almost had a copy of that book for 25 bucks ! I found a copy at an estate sale and almost fell over my self trying to get to the seller, only to be told that it was put out in error and wasnt for sale! I really think someone else had offered more and was coming back with money later. 275 $ is the least Ive seen it for lately.
Doug
That would be a great book to have indeed!!
Yeah it would Joe… Just a tad rich for my blood at this time! LOL…
Just got both of these over the last two days. I got em off of ebay. I had this kit several years ago when I was in Iraq but let it go along with alot of other stuff to “lighten the load” my final trip back to the states. My good buddy Reasoned inspired me after viewing his Bf109 A/B or C. I can’t ramember which one it was but I remember the paint scheme of an all metal bird with the top hat on the side of the aircraft.
Anyhow I got my kit back along with an additional reference:
I dunno if I’ll do it or not for the GB as I havent worked with alclad yet.
Sweet kit Mustang. But you sure that was a nmf bird? I thought they were painted in overall RLM 02?
It looked NMF to me but I’ve only seen internet pics of the decal set. Will let you know by next week when I have the decal set here. Not much research material on this bad boy yet.
Thanks for the word on the kit brutha!
This is the only reference I can find of Rall’s E.
http://www.premiumwooddesigns.com/Messerschmitt_Me_109E_Gunther_Rall_p/fgm109ss.htm
Nice finds Joe, looking forward to seeing an early 109 (something just not well represented out there by the modeling companies). My build was the Classic Airframes Bf 109B flown in the Spanish CW by Molders I believe. (EDIT* It was Gunther Lutzow’s crate)
That’s the one!! Mine being a C, I will try to replicate this anyways. It’s just too cool!!
Do you have any pictures / color plate reference for this bird?