Kampfgeschwader 55 collection

[jim murray]

One of the best book I’ve read and could recommend to anybody interested in the Luftwaffe at war or the Battle of Britain, is the book “Luftwaffe Encore” by Ken Wakefield it was first published in 1979. In it he describes two Luftwaffe raids on the British aircraft industry in September 1940. The first took place on the 25<SUP>th</SUP> and was carried out by KG55 it was an attack on the British aeroplane company at Filton, near Bristol. It was one of the few times that all three gruppen of KG55 flew together on the same raid. It was also one of the Luftwaffe’s most successful raids of the Battle of Britain with 95% of the bombs hitting the target. The other raid took place two days later on the 27<SUP>th</SUP> and was a raid on the Parnall Aircraft factory in Yate. This raid was carried out by Erpr Gruppe 210 and ZG 26 and was a complete disaster. <O</O
One of the contributors to the book was Oblt. Werner Oberlander of III gruppe KG55, and his flugbuch was quoted in the book. I am very lucky to have some items belonged to Werner Oberlander, his Pilots badge, his Spange bar in bronze, his Pilots licence and best of all his flugbuch [the one which was quoted in the book]. This summer I was very lucky to pick up [thanks to a fellow forum member] a set of target maps for the Filton raid, which were used by KG55 <O</O

[jim murray]

A page from the book and the target maps for the BAC Rodney engien works at Filton.

Map A

[jim murray]

Maps B and C

[jim murray]

Werner Oberlander was a pilot, and on the Filton raid was with III gruppe KG55 flying from Villacoublay, he flew 263 combat misions, until badly injured in Russia in 1943. He was a winner of the Houner Goblet, the DKiG and the Knightscross.
[on page one of this thread you can see Werner Oberlanders other items]

[jim murray]

His Flugbuch.
Mission #38 is the Filton raid, and mission #39 is a raid on Southampton which took place on the 26th the day after the Filton attack, this raid too was quiet successful.

[The Dragon]

Hi Jim,

I thought that map of Ireland was also very interesting. Possible they made a parachute drop. It was well known that IRA members joined the wehrmacht and were often dropped back home. Who knows eh?

[jim murray]

Hi Jim,

I thought that map of Ireland was also very interesting. Possible they made a parachute drop. It was well known that IRA members joined the wehrmacht and were often dropped back home. Who knows eh?

Good point, I never thought of that.

[jim murray]

A very interesting Honour goblet group to a Beobachter Robert Sellner of 3th Staffel KG55. He was awarded the honour goblet on the 15<SUP>th</SUP> July 1944. The Luftwaffe stopped publishing the “Honour List” in June 44 and in August 44 they stopped awarding the goblet itself. Considering when you think that there were about 50,000 Honour Goblets awarded, but only about 13,000 ever presented and the fact that he was awarded it only a month before they stopped awarding them altogether, the chances are that the document was all he was ever presented with.<O</O
<O</O
Robert Sellner’s Flugzeugbeobachter [observers] badge document<O</O

[jim murray]

Robert Sellner's Spange bar in bronze and in silver. Both documents are signed by Major Willie Antrup.

[jim murray]

His Spange in Gold again signed by Willie Antrup.

[jim murray]

Robert's EKII and EKI documents.

[jim murray]

Robert Sellner's Honour Goblet document. Was this his Honour Goblet?

[jim murray]

Pic1 Robert with his crew.
LtoR Bernd Roski [gunner] Walter Dietrich [flight engineer] Hans Breit [radio operator] Hans Caro [pilot] and Robert Sellner [observer]

pic2 Robert with Hans Caro and Hans Breit who is celebrating his 200th combat mission

[Angel Farré]

I think someone made a mistake, EK II dated 1944 and EK I in 1943.

Angel

[jim murray]

I think someone made a mistake, EK II dated 1944 and EK I in 1943.

Angel

Hi Angel,<O</O
Well spotted, I was going to mention it, but I decided to see would anybody spot it. The document is 100% genuine, as is the signature of Generallieutnant Rudolf Meister (I have a number of his signatures to compare with) Like you, I first thought it might be a typing error. But Meister did not hold the rank of Generallieutnant on the 8<SUP>th</SUP> June 1943, but did on the 8<SUP>th</SUP> June 1944. It is defiantly a strange one. It might be that Sellner was overlooked for his EKII and this was rectified after he received his EKI, in the photo you will notice that he is wearing his spange bar and Beobachters badge but not a EKII ribbon, a bit odd. Maybe someone on the forum with more knowledge on awards might have some ideas, I would love to hear from them. Have they come across this before? <O</O