Something has been nagging at me about part of this story..
It is claimed that the object retrieved in the 1940s was taken from the fuselage of a British Spitfire Fighter aircraft that had crashed in 1944 over
Denmark.
The first thing that struck me was that, it would be unusual for a Spitfire to found in that part of the Noerthern European skies in 1944, as it would
have been , AFAIK, out of range of a standard Spitfire from bases in England and at the very limit of it's combat range flown from, even the most
advanced Aliied airbase in late 1944.
Infact, i am pretty sure we can discount a standard Spitfire from crashing in Denmark in anything but late 1944 when the Allies had penetrated and
secured much of the Netherlands.
It could have been a reconaisance MXI or Mark19, as they did have the range to reach Denmark but the Mark Xi was phased out in 1944 and replaced with
the Mark 19..
Roughly 400 Allied aircraft were lost over Denmark, or in the seas around it. A list of many of them is here, including the names of crew where it is
known.
www.flensted.eu.com...
As you can see for yourself, although it is an extensive and detailed archive there is not one Spitfire listed in the downed aircraft for 1944 , or
any other year, for that matter. Infact the only single engined Aliied aircraft i can find, lost over Denmark, were all P51 Mustangs. That is no real
surprise, as the Mustangs were, by 1944, accompanying Bombers on sorties as long range escorts.
Sadly, then i can find no corroboratory evidence to support that a Spitfire was lost due to the actions of a Foo Fighter over Denmark.
This doesn't mean it didn't happen and, given the unusual nature of the crash, maybe the Germans deliberately kept no open record of the crash.
Again, hoewever it is surprising that the Danes, themselves, have no independent record of the incident.
The next factor we have to consider is this. Denmark was still occupied by German forces until, virtually, the end of WW2. To retrieve the object , in
the first place, the exact location of the crash must have been known. One can only assume that the original report was made by either the Whermacht
or the Luftwaffe.
I would say that it is perfectly feasible, given the unusual nature of the incident, that the Pilot radioed his plight and that both the Allies and
Lutwaffe monitored it and therefore made a note to make a special attmept to ascertain exactly what had happened. Afterall, most aircrew, from both
sides, thought Foo Fighters belonged to the other.
However there is a tantalising hint of what, maybe a clue, contained in the documents listed here. The Date May 12th 1948 appears on the report on
page 7. One the site i have given the link for the following information is given "Most of the Americans were brought out of the country in April /
May 1948 and transferred to Belgium and later to the United States."
Was the "artifact" shipped back after the excavations of the temporary graves were completed? Did a recovery crew slip into Denmark and retireve the
artifact from the wreckage and were the Lutwaffe unaware of what had transpired?
Why was the artifact shipped to the USA when it involved a British aircraft? Did the British know this had actually happened? One assumes they did, as
why were they looking for a crashed Spitfire so, dilligently, unless the pilot had managed to fire off some sort of message about his unusual
plight?
Or was the object handed over to the Americans by the Lutwaffe after WW2? Did the Americans actively seek the artifact or, where they made aware of it
by the Lutwaffe?
Continued in next post...
[edit on 21-1-2008 by FireMoon]