Rybin, Y. Luftwaffe ace Walter Schuck researched / Christer Bergstrom, Yuriy Rybin. - Sweden : [s. l.], 2019. - 190 p. : ill.

WALTER SCHUCK From left: Unteroffiziers Hans Link, Walter Schuck and Werner Schumacher, Obergefreiter Kurt Scharmacher, and Unteroffizier Helmut Klante. vanger, Schuck and the other men of 7./JG 5 woke up at the sound of antiaircraft guns opening fire. It was still dark when they tumbled out towards the shelter. Bombs exploded and fires were raging. When the raid was over and the fires had been put out, four Me 109s were found to be the victims of the attack. This was the RAF’s spe­ cial “welcoming” for 7./JG 5. Ten Whitley bombers of Nos. 58 and 77 squadrons had carried out the attack. To the men in 7./JG 5 it stood clear that the tranquile days were gone. The remaining weeks spent by the Staffel in Stavan­ ger however were fairly calm. Now and then the pilots were scrambled, but they didn’t encounter any enemy aircraft. Instead they got a good view of the fantastic Norwegian landscape from above. Schuck, who was fas­ cinated by the nature, became deeply impressed by what he could see during those flights: The fiords with its snow covered forested mountains heaving steeply from blue- green water, the seemingly endless forests, the small red huts here and there in what appeared to be more or less wilderness. Schuck thought that Norway must be one of the most beautiful and peaceful countries in the world. What no one of the pilots in 7./JG 5 knew by that time was that they were held in readiness to protect the Tirpitz - Germany’s largest battleship after the loss of Bismarck in May 1941 - with protection against possible British air attacks. On 14 January 1942, the Tirpitz left the German port of Wilhelmshaven. Steaming along the Norwegian coast, she anchored in the Faetten fiord near Trondheim two days later. It was clear that something “big” was meant for 7./ JG 5. In late January 1942, it was supplied with several more aircraft. Although these were planes which had been left over by other units - just as had been the case with the first Erganzungsstaffel - they served to build up 7./JG 5 to the considerable strength of fifteen Me 109s. They all were of the version Me 109 E, “Emil”, which by this time was ageing in the shadow of the latest ‘109 F version. Then a new transfer order arrived. Everyone packed their belongings, and the Staffel took off and flew towards the north, along the Norwegian coast. They crossed a very large fiord - the Hardanger fiord - and set to land at Herdla aerodrome near Bergen. “I don’t want to see any landing accidents this time,” Hauptmann Graf von Sponeck had told his pilots before take-off from Stavanger. Still the second last Me 109 to land nosed over. Fortunately, the pilot was unhurt and the damage on the craft proved to be only light. Heavy snowfall and fog held all air activity at Herdla down for a couple of days. When the sky cleared, 7./JG 5 took off again. This time Vaernes aerodrome at Trond­ heim, around three hundred miles farther up the coast, was the destination. But this too was only an intermedi­ ary landing. On 1 February 1942, 7./JG 5 arrived at its final destination, Bodo. T