Bf109E-4 of Wilhelm Fronhöfer

This is the Bf109E-4 flown by Wilhelm Fronhöfer of 9./JG26 in which he made a wheels up landing in England on August 31st, 1940. Interestingly it lacks any yellow I.D. markings although III./JG26 was among the units that had used yellow wingtips and tailtips since early or mid August. III./JG26 aircraft had even been recorded with a full yellow nose only days before. Yet on August 31 aircraft from both III/JG26 and I./JG3 that came down in England lacked any yellow I.D. markings. Perhaps in preparation for what came a couple of days later when many fighter units on the channel front suddenly switched to white I.D. markings instead of yellow. 

More on that in my next post!

Bf109E-4 Walter Blume

My first Bf109E profile shows the aircraft of Walter Blume as it looked in August 1940. The rudder shows four victory markings. Blume had claimed his fourth victory on July 25:th but the yellow wing tips and wedge on the rudder were starting to see use in the first half of August 1940. On this day, August 15:th, 75 years ago, Blume claimed his fifth victory, a Spitfire, east of Dover. This pinpoints the date of the photo to the first two weeks of August 1940.

Apart from the early form of yellow I.D. markings, what makes Blumes aircraft interesting is that color photos shows his aircraft to be painted in non standard camouflage colors. The lighter color on the spine is clearly much greyer than the RLM 02 engine bearers shown in the photos. The darker colour could be a dark grey or a faded RLM 70. There are many indicators that III./JG26 experimented with grey colors during the summer of 1940. One being the crash report on Werner Bartels Bf109E-1 and another being a color photo of a 9./JG26 aircraft clearly showing a grey camouflage as well. Finally there's Gallands claim that the tests done by JG26 in the summer of 1940 led to the use of RLM 74/75 for fighters. 

Hopefully I'll be able to add more "On this day, 75 years ago" posts during the autumn.