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continued …
I 'd like to emphasise that I could be wrong. My main effort to research the disappearance of Saint-Exupéry was when I was in contact with Georg Pemler 20 or so years ago. I was interested in the Luftwaffe's response to the Allied landings on the Riviera in August and he asked what I could find out for him in the British archives. He said he had been involved in an inquiry in 1944 and had been well placed to debunk a post-war story that one of his NAGr. 13 comrades, Robert Heichele, had shot the Frenchman down. That account, published in 1972 in the war-story magazine Der Landser (The Squaddie) Nr. 725, was purportedly based on a letter from Heichele to Ltn. Wilhelm Manz of 4./JG 3 and dated 1 August 1944. It appears little better than a fairytale when compared to contemporary documentation:
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»Der Landser«
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Primary Sources
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Heichele was one of four pilots flying the long-nosed Fw 190 D, powered by a Jumo 213, fitted with two Rb 12.5/7 x 9 cameras, two 300-litre auxiliary tanks and a reduced armament of two MG 151/20 cannon
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No Fw 190 D entered frontline service with the Luftwaffe until III./JG 54 received its first machines at the end of September (ULTRA CX/MSS/T318/55). In July 1944, 2./NAGr. 13 was flying radial-engined Fw 190 A and F variants.
I have seen no source substantiating an Fw 190 D-series variant with two cameras and the ability to carry two auxiliary tanks.
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They flew from Orange
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2./NAGr. 13 flew from Cuers-Pierrefeu. Orange is about 150 km further from Corsica, one of the unit’s main targets.
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He shot down a Spitfire from a group of 18 encountered on 24 July 1944
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Fliegerdivision 2’s report of sorties on 24 July (ULTRA CX/MSS/T256/21) does not support this: “2 Fw 190 from 1745 to 1843 hours [GMT] of sea area between Corsica and Toulon. At 1830 hours attack from above and behind by 3 Spitfires. Rotte Leader missing.”
The pilot shot down was, it seems, Obltn. Ludwig Klink (Jägerblatt 3/2003). Two Fw 190 were sent out next day to look for him (CX/MSS/T262/32).
The only Spitfire lost was in a landing accident with the pilot unhurt. Two Spitfires of No. 93 Squadron RAF intercepted two Fw 190 just south of Nice at 20.27 (GMT+2). W/O Bobby Bunting shot one down while Sgt. D.L. Marek pursued the other and expended all his ammunition but it escaped him. (AIR 23/6510: MATAF Int/Opsums Nos. 386–477 (complete) (1944) and AIR 25/753: Operations Record Book, No. 93 Squadron (1944)).
The Luftwaffe claims lists do credit a Spitfire to another reconnaissance pilot that day. Oberfeldwebel Lober of 1./NAGr. 11 shot down F/O Douglas Bennett of No. 241 Squadron into the Adriatic off Fano, Italy that evening. (AIR 27/1466: Operations Record Book, No. 241 Squadron (1 January 1944–31 August 1945) and AIR 27/1470: Operations Record Book Appendices, No. 241 Squadron (1 July 1944–31 August 1945)).
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He encountered a Lightning over Castellane on 31 July which attacked from superior altitude and a dogfight ensued
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The F-5B flown by Saint-Exupéry was an unarmed reconnaissance version and in no position to engage enemy aircraft.
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Heichele got behind the enemy and shot him down about 10 km south of St. Raphaël (Square AT)
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The given position is not in Square AT which covered an area of the Ligurian Sea between Albenga and La Spezia.
Fliegerdivision 2, to which 2./NAGr. 13 was subordinated, dispatched 12 sorties on 31 July, none of them by an Fw 190, and reported “Successes and losses: nil return.” (CX/MSS/T263/29 and T263/30).
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What's here is what I had when the Rippert story broke, supplemented by radio monitoring reports first released in 2001, a day’s archival research in September 2008 (using files not released in the 1990s) and some downloads from the Bundesarchiv in 2023 but it's pretty clear where it points. There is one piece of the jigsaw that I didn't find for Pemler or since: a deciphered operations report for 31 July from Jafü Süd. I have not found it in the National Archives’ DEFE 3 file series nor in HW 5: I may have missed it or it may simply not exist. If it turns up and it it records a combat with a Lightning then I will gladly stand corrected.
Like other researchers, I look forward to seeing what contemporary documentary evidence Lino von Gartzen's two years of research unearthed. I don't think I'm alone in believing that something more substantial is needed than one man's memory of events then 64 years in the past.
On 24 April 2008, Lino von Gartzen kindly contacted me. He said that he had been trying for a year to get "more and more details to prove his [Rippert's] story" and continued:
"As I found so many details "pro" Rippert and so few "contra", I was (and I'm still) sure for my part that this version of the last flight is the best hypothesis ever discovered for this case. No more, no less. …
My aim was always sharing and exchanging information with serious working researchers, because only in this way can you get closer and closer to the reconstruction of history. Even uncomfortable questions by others may help more than just going in the desired direction."
We may favour different conclusions but I agree with everything he says in his second paragraph. Once again, my thanks for his taking the time to respond. His own website is well worth a look too.
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