The Legendary German Aces Killed in Accidents and Bizarre Ways - Historic Countdown

[@TJ3]

Go subscribe to Wondrium and enjoy your free trial! Your brain is going to love it here. ow.ly/NnXr30seLxC

[@FabioQuadrana]

It's incredible how many casualties between famous aces has produced the ME 109 G.

[@DNorthWest]

Indeed, arguably the best historical research and literature on the WW2 aero engine horsepower war is Calum Douglas’s book “The Secret Horsepower Race: Western Front Fighter Engine Development.” He is a mechanical engineer who worked on Toyota, Ferrari, and Mercedes Formula 1 engines. He undertook comprehensive research into the British and RLM archives held by the IWM. Working for Mercedes, he was allowed access to their historical information, similarly Rolls-Royce and BMW. Fundamentally, the problem with the 605 engine was the lack of specific specialist materials and the incompetence of the RLM. BMW solved the lack of Cobalt for the 801 engine by chromium plating; it took 12 months for Daimler-Benz to implement a similar approach for the 605 engines due to the lack of fundamental control by the RLM. Though the NAZIS were notorious for operating a divide and conquer culture. The Fedden report covers this in detail. BMW had to redesign and test the exhaust pop value 10 times and crank shaft 3 times for the 801 engine because of the constant variations and lack of the availability of specialist materials. Undoubtedly true for the 605 engines with similar results and resulting in the failures.

[@griffn14]

Gunther Scheel had 71 victories in 70 missions, he collided with a Yak-9 on his last one. Could fit in this series.

[@TJ3]

Thanks!

[@Flying_Snakes]

I don't know why these don't get way more views. The vids are awesome with great content. Keep them coming!

[@michaelbatson1879]

Anton Hafner, the highest-scoring pilot of JG 51 with 204 kills, was killed in low-level dogfight when he crashed into a tree.

[@zachmalone428]

I love how you use flight simulators to tell great stories! I really thought this was a novel idea till I saw your channel!

[@jibeco]

Thanks once again TJ. Very good story. Video, narration, all very well done.

[@TJ3]

Thanks!

[@Tiagomottadmello]

Great vídeo !! 👍🏻👍🏻

[@JUNKERS488]

Awesome video enjoyed every minute of it. Thanks for all your hard work and research I know from my days of doing the Luftwaffe models for museums that the research is one of the hardest parts. When Dresden was bombed most of the Luftwaffe's files, blueprints, Photos and films were lost and now with time even more stuff is lost to history as the pilots and crews that worked on these amazing aircraft are all but gone now too. Looking forward to your next video. Enjoy your weekend my friend.

[@peterkellyman5974]

Heinrich Sturm, 158 victories, met his fate while taking off, when one of his Bf 109 G-6/U4 landing gear struts hit a truck.

[@elijamatt7929]

being shot down is not exactly a "bizarre" way to die for a fighter pilot.

[@johnathanczakel5195]

You must do a video about the stigler incident if you haven't yet done so!!! Stigler was a German ace and spotted a lone b-17 bomber critically damaged with huge gaping holes torn in the fuselage, all crewmen injured and the tail gunner dead. It was flying with only one engine on full power and without some of its tail. Stigler realizing it would be just liking shooting a man in a parachute, instead escorted the bomber across German territory allowing the crew to return to home base. The b-17 was piloted by Charlie Brown.

[@seanodwyer4322]

john- yeah but they may have killed heaps germens later with bombing off Dresden/ other . Should hav given them a mercy kill.

[@TJ3]

Thanks so much for watching everyone. Please comment any other suggestions, and if you missed my first video in this series, check it out here! (This one includes some other great German Aces!) kzbin.info/www/bejne/h4KTlqSooseIbpo

[@DogWalkerBill]

A few years ago, there was a documentary about a German ace. (I don't remember his name.) He did not support the Nazi Party, but was fighting for his country. He started in a ME 109 and had an extraordinary record. Later graduated to other air planes, maybe the ME 262. He also tested new & experimental planes. While he was doing this, his experimental plane failed. He bailed out but was hit in the head by the rudder or stabilizers and knocked unconscious. He fell to the earth and was killed. His air combat comrades put an epitaph on his gravestone, "Never Conquered" (Or maybe "Never Bested") since he was never killed by an enemy. These kind of stories interest me. In many cases they knew the Nazis were Bad Guys, but still fought with bravery & excellence. I've often wondered what motivated a man to fight with extraordinary excellence while fighting for people they knew were Bad Guys?

[@tim7052]

I think you may be referring to Hans Joachim Marseilles, who shot down 158 aircraft (all his opponents being British and Commnwealth pilots and aircrew), and he was known as The Star of Africa. He wasn't a card-carrying member of the Nazi Party but loved flying - even though he was a shaky pilot at the beginning of his career. Galland rated him as the best fighter pilot in the entire Luftwaffe. Marseilles, against orders, had an African POW as his batman. He also loved jazz music - which Hiter and his Party loathed - and would play "Rumba Azul" over and over in his tent. He was an individualist and was known for his insubordination and playboy lifestyle. Until he was ordered to stop, he also took pains to ensure his opponents were well treated and personally dropped notes on their airfields to inform the RAF of their condition. Marseilles was killed when the cockpit of his Me-109 G2 (a model of Messerschmitt he disliked) was filled with smoke, causing him to bail out. As he left the aircraft, his left chest slammed into the vertical tail fin, which both lacerated his chest and most likely knocked him unconscious. As a result, he fell to his death. Later, they built a pyramid over the spot where he was found. Today, people still visit the pyramid - on it is written one word: UNDEFEATED.

[@dr.kroenen2425]

The 🌟 of Africa

[@alwaddle7390]

Terrific content & presentation, as always. Thanks

[@tim7052]

Truly a bizarre death: Heinz-Wolfgang Schnaufer, the highest scoring German (and "All time") nightfighter ace survived WWII but was killed in a car accident on 13th of July 1950, with a French Renault F22 truck loaded with 6 tonnes of empty gas cylinders (some reports state the truck was loaded with lumber which had fallen onto Schnaufer).

[@tsmgguy]

Aviation is always unforgiving, even more so in wartime.

[@MrHistoryguy1955]

Great and interesting vid keep it up 👍🏻

[@juliusdream2683]

Great video. That was some bad luck for great airmen.

[@michaelbatson1879]

ME-109s didn't just have engine problems. The early 109 F's had problems with wings collapsing. This is what got JG 2 Experten Wilhelm Baltasar killed while engaging in air combat on the Channel front in 1941.

[@davidewhite69]

*Bf-109

[@chasespeer251]

@@davidewhite69 This has been beaten to death. BF-109 is the 'more correct' name but considering even the Luftwaffe and Messerschmitt used ME and BF interchangably, both should be considered accurate. There are parts literally on the plane that call it a ME-109

[@josefhorndl3469]

@@davidewhite69 German pilots didn't say Bf 109, they said "Die (The) Me" or "Me Hundertneun (109)". Believe me, they told me so (RIP guys!). Official names were BFW Bf 109, Messerschmitt Bf 109 or BFW Me 109. To honor Willy Messerschmitt the official name was at last Messerschmitt Bf 109.

[@JayvH]

Wasn't he in JG 26?

[@americanpatriot2422]

Outstanding video and presentation.

[@TJ3]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@alwayssmiley01]

Loving your work Great stuff 🤙😁

[@matydrum]

Free french pilot Pierre Clostermann talks in an interview about being sent to an instruction day watching gun cam footage with other RAF pilots and one of the footage was from a P 47 shooting at a German in a parachute, they were all shocked and he said that it was more tolerable for us pilots, "one less Nazi who could fly another day and kill one of our boys" he more or less quoted. Apparently the British instructor said sadly "I wanted them to become warriors, not killers".

[@openroad6522]

When Hans Ulrich Rudel was in flight classes for the Luftwaffe the instructor told the class if he ever heard of one of the students firing on someone in a parachute, he would kill them himself.

[@sergiogregorat1830]

Source, please ?! If he really comes from Clostermann, that doesn't add much credibility to his scripts ... (in fact, he looks more like a novelist to me than a chronicler). To my knowledge, this bad episode was reported with pride by a certain Major David Schilling (not that of the Flying Tigers), after he shot a 262 pilot in a parachute, without subsequently receiving any reprimand from his companions on the ground. You can find it in W.W.E. Samuel's "American Raiders for Luftwaffe Secrets" (free Kindle excerpt, location 386 ).

[@matydrum]

@@sergiogregorat1830 do you speak french? I can find the interview for you but it's not in English? What do you mean ? He's the top scoring french ace of WW2, he flew spits and tempest and ended the war squadron leader, not in a free french squadron but a regular RAF tempest squadron, not many foreigners achieve that kind of level in the RAF.

[@sergiogregorat1830]

@@matydrum Thanks for the reply. I don't speak French (not even English, as you can appreciate, but Google works wonders ...), I read Le Grand Cirque (La Grande Giostra in Italian) in 1959, enjoing the non-fanatic tones of the narrative, but at the same time remaining rather dubious on some incidents (for example the crash landing of a companion and his subsequent horrible burning death). It was my first chance to get to know new types of aircraft, on both sides (Typhoon, Tempest, Long Nose Doras, Ar 232, Do 335). Yet to this day, I can't understand why the author confuses Nowotny with that other Luftwaffe ace (Oesau? Ostermann?) who saved some Allied POWs from being shot.

[@matydrum]

@@sergiogregorat1830 I don't see what's so extraordinary about his friend burning in the cockpit, unfortunately that happened. Also his book is quite famous, he would have been called out on that if it didn't happened. They are however things in the book that he got wrong, and he also talks about it in that long interview, he says for exemple that he claimed a long nose fw 190 in a place and at a time in the war where he found out later that it was not possible. He chose to leave it " because it was from his war diary and wanted to leave it as he lived it". By the way his friend Jaques Reminger, the guy who shot Romel's car in Normandy, who flew a lot as his wing man, survived the war too and there are some interviews of him as well.

[@That70sGuitarist]

Excellent video, very informative on a subject I'm keenly interested in. One note, though; "Gerhard" is not pronounced "Gerard," but "gare-hard."😉

[@thehitmangaming1980]

Such a great channel!!!

[@COACHWARBLE]

Sweet video

[@panzer_de_faust]

I have never heard of this new pilots but it was an excellent video.

[@pistolpete6321]

Very interesting, great video!

[@TJ3]

Thanks!

[@derekzimmermann2551]

Thanks man love these videos. Its so refreshing to see these pilots treated as people too, instead of the normal gut reaction of assuming that every german in germany was just like hitler. I had grandparents who flew on both sides of the war and all they were ever trying to do was fight for their friends and family.

[@TJ3]

I agree. Thank you

[@ChillGamerLad]

i agree, i have the utmost respect for any airman in WW2, allied or axis.

[@skyden24195]

My grandmother was a young girl living in Liverpool, England during the bombing raids of WWII. Years later, after marrying my USAF airman grandfather, she would at some point, not only be living on a U.S. airbase in Germany, but one of her neighbors was the Germany-born wife of another USAF airman. My grandmother and the neighbor, from what I'm told, got along just fine as neighbors despite their respective birth-country's relatively recent, wartime-adversary relationship.

[@derekzimmermann2551]

@@skyden24195 Wow yeah. My German grandmother left Nuremburg as a refugee the day before it got firebombed, then married my grandfather who was an American from the signal corps. Her uncle died on the eastern front and my other grandfather flew corsairs and hellcats in the Pacific. So wild. Guess some good came of it because we're here huh?

[@skyden24195]

@@derekzimmermann2551 lol. Apologies, as I understand there are not so humorous events mentioned in your comment, but that last part about us being here really made me laugh, and not just because the statement itself is funny. Understanding the history of how I came to be (so to speak) I've long since considered myself the product of two wars: WWII, due my grandparents meeting each other in the aftermath. The other war being Vietnam, which forced my dad to enlist and get accepted into the USAF. My dad would be assigned to the same US air base that my USAF grandfather was assigned to. That, if you haven't guessed, would be where my dad would eventually meet my mom.

[@Gregory_Beaver]

"See you in Walhalla" Heinrich Ehrler I am asking for an approximate silhouette of this pilot because he is a really interesting figure.

[@MGB-learning]

Great video

[@toddmccowen8206]

tell us about what they found in FW-190 not long ago that we now use .

[@dhss333]

You don't need to reinforce ""climb" with "upward" or "previous" with "before". Great series, graphics.

[@РепаХрюнберг]

On July 22, 1942, his Bf-109F-4/Trop W. Nr. 10256 made a forced landing behind the front line in the Motovsky Gulf area due to an engine failure, but Horst Carganico managed to reach the German positions. On August 12, 1942, his Bf-109F-4/Trop W. Nr. 10132 was shot down in combat and again made a forced landing in the Motovsky Gulf area, and again Carganico was able to avoid capture and cross the front line.

[@matheusdossandos3243]

Egon Albrecht the Brazilian who was the only Brazilian to win the Iron Cross

[@seanodwyer4322]

tell me his history.

[@scooterinvegas1]

The German that was shot in the parachute was seen earlier shooting American pilots in their parachutes. As they say, revenge is a dish best served cold.

[@kirgan1000]

Source? It sound very stupid to waste time and attention to shoot at a American pilot that parachute over Germany. He will be a prisoner and out of the war. But it make sense to shoot a german pilot, becuse he can be back to the war next day.

[@scooterinvegas1]

@@kirgan1000 kzbin.info/www/bejne/jJTCg32kjb9rj9E

[@melianhoover1910]

Sorry,wheres your source? Weve long been waiting you,to share the source.

[@lucasrexroth8526]

Steinhoff's accident in JG 27 (Survived) or Hans Joachim Marseille in North africa

[@amievil3697]

There us a video of who killed Barten and why

[@55cleon]

Shooting A Guy In His Parachute Is Some Punk Shit

[@kayschmitz1155]

could u also make a vidio of allied aces killed in accidents.

[@TJ3]

Already have one! Making another soon.

[@manithrupasinghe8744]

Hans schweiger was strafed by USAF pilots in 1944 when he had to forces land his damaged 109.horrible way to die.

[@SKIBIDTOILET960]

Pearl harbour ghost plane It was December of 1942, a year and a day after the Japanese sneak attack that launched the United States into World War II. The American Navy was on guard at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. Published accounts say that radar contact was made with an incoming aircraft, and fearing another attack, fighter planes were scrambled to intercept it. But instead of an attacking Japanese bomber, they encountered a ghost fighter: a pre-war American aircraft, shot to pieces, with its pilot apparently dead at the controls. It lost altitude and crashed in a field, but rescue crews found no trace of the pilot's body.

[@SKIBIDTOILET960]

The ghost planes class: p40 warhawk

[@rogerpartner1622]

What about the 13 out of 16 Stuka s. That couldn’t pull up. And all plummeted down next to the high command there to watch the super flying skills ???

[@michaleeuwe]

Gerard Barkhorn would be an interesting story.

[@robertbrulc8435]

I don’t be I eve you’ve done a Hans Ulrich Rudel video yet. Rudel video?…Yeah, Rudel video. Dooo ett. Oh, right. Please.

[@b2bomber969]

Love from India Bro 🇮🇳

[@EladZaiffer]

losing a dogfight to a P-47 is wild

[@briancooper2112]

Cool video. But I'd like to see more stories on àllied pilots than nazis.

[@TJ3Show]

Wow this guy is great

[@theminutemen1275]

Didn't that first ace killed in his parachute get shot because he was known for killing men in their parachutes and had been doing it just before being shot down himself?

[@kirkstinson7316]

Its funny how the different services view shooting a man in a parachute. Airmen find this very wrong (they, at least in WWII still saw themselves as knights of the air). But infantry have little problem shooting paratroopers as the are descending in their parachutes.

[@patolt1628]

Well, it's not that simple. Just a clarification, based on the Geneva convention if I may: - Firing at a pilot after he bailed out of his airplane is illegal and considered as a war crime since he is not able to fight anymore, so to speak. - On the other hand, firing at paratroopers (or their transport planes) is "legal" since thses paratroopers are on the way to the fight. I'm not saying what is right or wrong: that's just the way it is, "technically" speaking. Regarding Franz Barten, it's clearly a war crime. For Koppen as well, the difference being that usually, when you bail out just on top the people you were straffing seconds before, it's very rare to be welcome with flowers. These people on the ground have a tendancy to be angry, especially if they just lost some friends. So it should not happen but... There are conventions but chivalrous behaviour is outdated, to say the least. Keep in mind that war is pure hell, nothing else.

[@haroldgodwinson832]

Possibly, but I suspect it had less to do with seeing themselves as "knights of the air" and a lot more to do with seeing themselves, in a parachute, being shot at by enemy fighters. What goes around comes around.

[@grapegrishnahk8930]

I remember a story told by an American fighter pilot who said he witnessed a German pilot going from parachute to parachute of downed bomber airmen and blasting them out of the sky and so when the American finally shot the German down and he had to bail he returned the favor and blasted him into another dimension while in his parachute

[@haroldgodwinson832]

@@grapegrishnahk8930 Possibly one of the most far fetched stories to come out of the war. Frankly, just absurd nonsense. If you understood anything about late-war air combat you would understand why.

[@patolt1628]

@@grapegrishnahk8930 Yes it's a true story

[@themadmoderator8465]

my only issue is the credibility given german axis score counts. fact no gun cams second you look at allied pilots with gun cams and find out the claimed vs proven kills are miles apart. dont get me wrong they were aces and had high number of kills but you add up totals then look at allied losses and the numbers are miles off

[@tim7052]

These pilots died from "Pilot's Poison" - because all it takes to kill is one drop!! I 👍

[@spectrelfc1152]

Shooting someone in their parachute is classless

[@rogerdailey9357]

Your video graphics are excellent and narration makes makes my video look terrible. The man that shot down my Uncles Plane on 15-May-1943 was Gunther Specht. I’m saddened to hear our men shot German fighters in parachutes. Top German ace said that was same as murder. Herman G. said that is the answer I would expect from you.

[@melianhoover1910]

What hsppened to your uncle?

[@rogerdailey9357]

@@melianhoover1910 Thank you for asking. My uncle was shot dow 15 May43. You can watch his story on your tube. In summary he saved 4 of his 10 crew but sacrificed his life to do so. Every pilot present past or future would do the same nothing new here. His story can be found on KZbin “3 days in May 1943”. Uncle Franks is my moms younger brother. He is home in Pleasant Valley Cemetery resting in peace.

[@melianhoover1910]

@@rogerdailey9357 Thankyou for your answer! I always wonder,how these experts managed to pair the airpilots claims with actually downed planes.

[@SilverWolfPL]

Horst Carganico a Polish Native? Where did You find information backing that up? He was born in Breslau (today's Wroclaw) which was German untill 1945 - maybe this is the reason of confusion?

[@justarandomguylol6481]

So close to 75k....

[@LowBrandon]

I remember a German aced though I forgot his name, while dogfighting a group of Russian plane he collided head on with a Russian plane and both aircraft blew up mid air.

[@tplyons5459]

JG-5 was in Norway not France

[@boarzwid1002]

August Lambert FW 190 kIA 1945

[@Calatriste54]

Helmut Wick.. (bitte)

[@thedrifter9814]

Warthunder gameplay?!?!

[@timf6916]

Cool

[@samkangal8428]

Very unfair the way Barten died .

[@scootergeorge7089]

Not unfair. The man was a skilled Luftwaffe ace. He was shot down over German occupied territory. Had Barton been shot down over England, he would have ended up in a POW camp and no longer a threat to Allied pilots and aircrew. Over Germany, he would have been able to take to the air again and resume killing. Just another example of the inhumanity of war.

[@samkangal8428]

@ScooterGeorge O.K ,it makes sense what you say ,and yes ,wars are cruel .

[@charleebunch6637]

🤔 one of my countrymen shooting a fucking unarmed parachute, no wonder I totally agree with unrestricted submarine warfare

[@CC-1138Bacara]

Walter Nowotny

[@skyden24195]

I have commented elsewhere of my distain towards pilots of the Japanese Empire, during WWII, who shot at parachuted airmen after they have bailed out of a downed aircraft. Of an American pilot committing the same vile act, I think no better of; in fact, I'm probably more disgusted as, to my understanding, Japanese pilots were encouraged to do so by their leadership; in contrast, U.S. pilots (just as German pilots) were discouraged from doing the same. An fyi: In the 1944, Humphrey Bogart film, "Passage to Marseille," there is a scene which depicts a German fighter performing machine-gun scrapes of an Allied warship at sea. The crew of the warship manage to shoot down the German aggressor which crashes onto the water near the warship. The surviving German crew seek to be rescued by the warship, however members of the warship crew, having just lost companions to the machine-gun attacks, decide instead to gun down the survived German crew in retaliation.

[@rogerrabbit80]

Recalling a long-ago class in the Laws of Land Warfare, shooting at a parachuting pilots is legal for ground troops if the pilot is going to land behind his own lines. The justification is that a pilot landing behind his own lines is still able to fight, while one landing in enemy territory is likely to be captured and thus unable to do any more harm. Edit- Oops. Ancient memory playing tricks on me. Seems parachuting pilots are not to be engaged (unless they use whatever weapons they may have). Once landed, they are to be given a reasonable opportunity to surrender. If they land behind their own lines, then they become legitimate targets again, just like any other enemy soldier - unless ill or injured sufficiently to keep them "hors de combat". Sorry for the mistake.

[@skyden24195]

@@rogerrabbit80 Interesting and clarifying information. Thanks for that. The stipulations indicated do make sense.

[@sergiogregorat1830]

@@rogerrabbit80 Congratulations on your fairness and honesty. In fact, shooting a parachute (whether it is a pilot or a trooper) without the subject having already fired effectively at you, seems to me a rather incorrect action. But try to tell it to the inhabitants of Crete, who instead are exalted as heroic freedom fighters, or to some good Londoners who have hung from a lamp post the survivor of the famous Dornier 17 rammed by a Hurricane (as learned from an English documentary). It is often forgotten that even civilians must obey certain rules, in war as well as in peace.

[@rogerrabbit80]

@@sergiogregorat1830 Having looked it up to refresh my memory, it turns out shooting at descending paratroopers is legal - just as shooting at enemy soldiers advancing on the ground are legitimate targets. In both cases, armed enemy troops are approaching your position to engage you. The paratroopers just happen to be doing so by falling from the sky.

[@sergiogregorat1830]

@@rogerrabbit80 I partly agree with you. A fully equipped paratrooper can be equaled to an advancing soldier, the only difference being that the former is totally defenseless (albeit well armed), while the latter can at least dodge or dig a hole. The question remains with the civilians, who in any case should not participate in the fighting. Sad to say, but children, women, the elderly have no other option than to stay in the hope of surviving. Militarized civilians must be clearly identified by even a simple armband (Volkssturm, France Libre etc.) if they want adequate treatment according to the conventions of war. Spontaneous uprisings have always been used as cannon fodder by self-righteous leaders to discredit opponents. The only way civilians can contribute is to prevent war in peacetime and not clap their hands enthusiastically at the departure of their troops to the front, waiting for the inevitable victory.

[@conceptalfa]

👍 👍 👍!!!

[@tykruszka]

Why is little homie pronouncing all the German names with British and French accents

[@dave8599]

becuase the nazis lost, that is why we dont speak with an evil nazi accent.

[@lincoln5310]

The 1st one got shot because he was doing the same thing to the Americans

[@TJ3]

No that was a different occasion.

[@sopwithsnoopy8779]

Joachim Kirschner 188 victories, killed by Yugoslav partisans.

[@simonheed7964]

All very bizarre???

[@JH-ox7hn]

War criminals anyone?

[@klesarhr-bz5of]

3:37 impossible, yenks would never do such 🤣

[@apooru241]

Werner molders

[@robertsmith2227]

Giant shrimp. Pretty ugly. Deafening silence. A Pole in the Luftwaffe.

[@dhss333]

Skip the first 3 mins'. spam.

[@ScienceFan1859]

Hmm…. A nazi stuff film…I’m kinda conflicted….

[@gamingwithflight6179]

Firs

[@thefightingswallow7613]

Secon

[@gamingwithflight6179]

Lol

[@gamingwithflight6179]

@@thefightingswallow7613 that was a typo

[@joeyandmichaelyu7066]

Erich Hartman

[@BoomVang]

Argh, I cannot remain silent. Engines out do not cause stalls; you simply lower the nose a few degrees. Engines out don't always cause crashes either; many German pilots started their flying lessons in sailplanes due to treaty restrictions. I don't like the pro German pilot tone here in the context of late in war where German atrocities were going ballistic, and if their pilots could be prevented from recovering from a bailout to fly again, so be it. I would lose the sing-song narrative spin and let neutral facts speak for themselves.