Erich Hohagen recalled the news when they learned that “The Rammer” had survived. The pilots on the mission has seen him bail out, but leaving an aircraft during a heated battle did not ensure survival. “Fährmann received the call, as he answered the phone, and we learned that Schallmoser was alive. He called us himself after that call from the local gauleiter. He asked if anyone could confirm his kill. I told him, ‘Not that I know of,’ but we could confirm that he had cost us another jet. It was good that he was alive, and we could later confirm his victory.”{4}
Schallmoser’s Me 262 on this mission was work number 111745 and was a loss. Later, he would fly “White 14,” which has been erroneously attributed to this mission. He had previously flown “White 5” and “White 11,” which were lost. Galland’s statement makes the actual aircraft he was flying that day quite clear. He should know, as he had just flown the same aircraft the previous day.
Galland’s JV-44 had entered the war late, but they did so with a flurry of activity, such as on April 24, 1945, when the Hell Hawks escorted B-26 Marauders during their bombing of the oil storage facility at Schrobenhausen and encountered the jet fighters of JV-44.{5} On this day, JV-44, led by their intrepid fighter general, attacked a formation of B-26 Marauders of the 34th Bomb Squadron, 17th Bomb Group, whose primary target was the German ammunition supply depot at Schwabmünchen.
The first Marauder mission was terminated due to weather, while the second mission consisting of three bombers was uneventful. The third sortie flown with only three Marauders escorted by P-47s from the 356th Fighter Group in three staggered flights was a different story. Of the escorts, Blue Flight led by Capt. Jerry G. Mast flew top cover at 20,000 feet, Green Flight led by 1st Lt. O. T. Cowan at 17,000, and White Flight was led by Major Hill poised below the bombers as an immediate interdiction force.
Four Me 262s emerged from the clouds for their favored attack approach, from the stern. The P-47 pilots saw them at six o’clock low, and the first to respond was a previous jet killer, 1st Lt. Oliven T. Cowan, who swooped in from 17,000 feet. He fired a few bursts into the jet on the far right of the formation. The rest scattered at being ambushed, forcing them to abandon the attack on the bombers.{6} Having altitude was indeed life insurance, but Allied pilots, especially those flying the heavy seven-ton P-47s, knew that if they had altitude, and the conditions were right, they could kill jets, as chronicled by Dorr and Jones:
“One of the jets turned for another pass at the tails of the B-26s. This time Capt. Jerry G. Mast spotted the Messerschmitt and executed a split-S from two thousand feet above, cutting off the enemy pilot, who dove sharply away. Picking up the chase was 2nd Lt. William H. Myers, who dove vertically at the jet at more than five hundred miles per hour. Myers, overtaking, waited for the jet to slow as it shallowed from its dive.
“When the Luftwaffe pilot began to level, he spotted both Mast and Myers closing from the rear, and pushed over again into a steep dive. It was a fatal mistake. Boxed in from above, the Messerschmitt slammed into the earth at terrific speed and exploded in a rain of flaming debris. Both Mast and Myers had to execute a punishing high-g pullout, Myers blacking out momentarily, to avoid the 262’s fate. The rest of the squadron ran off the other three jets, which were unable to penetrate the 388th’s fighter screen or hit a single Marauder.”{7}
The action was also chronicled by Foreman and Harvey, as they described the event when White Flight saw the jets first, and called them out, and as they could not catch them in the climb, they radioed Green Flight to engage. As Green Flight went into the dive to engage, the jets streaked upward. Cowan had managed to get within range and get good strikes on the trailing Me 262, but could not follow it to confirm a kill as all the jets opened the distance between themselves and their pursuers.{8}
Captain Mast was able to catch one of the jets in a wide turn as he banked around for an attack on the bombers. At the last second, the jet pilot saw the danger and rolled into a dive through the cloud layer with Mast and Blue Flight close behind. The jet was headed into the covey of White Flight fighters, out of sight under the clouds. As the jet dropped under the cloud cover, he was picked up by 1st Lt. William H. Myers, Hill’s wingman. He saw the jet drop within his line of sight with Mast right behind him.{9}
The jet pilot then tried to pull around to shake off Mast when he turned head-on into White straight ahead, with Myers coming head-on firing at him. The jet then dropped the nose and headed for the deck, Mast still behind him. The jet struck the ground and exploded. Mast managed to pull out of the dive, clipping some treetops in the process. Both Meyers and Mast shared the kill.
During all of this, another jet attacked the bombers. Blue Flight’s 1st Lt. Byron Smith Jr. managed to get some strikes on the fins as the German pulled away into the clouds, out of sight. Smith shared the damaged claim with 1st Lt. Dale Seslar, and despite their efforts, two B-26 Marauders were shot down, flown by 1st Lt. Fred Harms (crashed at Oberoth) and 1st Lt. Leigh Slates (crashed at Untershönegg). Only Staff Sergeant Edward F. Truver survived out of both crews after bailing out to become a prisoner of war.{10}
Foreman and Harvey argue that it is most likely that the jet victory shared by Myers and Mast was flown by Oberst Günther Lützow, who failed to return from that mission. A detailed check of the German records and interviews of the German pilots by this author supports their conclusion. During the day’s events, two P-47 pilots from the 27th Fighter Group, 1st Lt. R. E. Prater and 1st Lt. J. F. Lipiarz, both claimed one jet damaged each during their escort duty that day while working in the same area. 1st Lt. D. S. Renner of the 358th Fighter Group (Ninth Air Force) claimed two jets damaged near Odelzhausen.
April 24 was a long day for JV-44, and it was not finished, as they also engaged a group of straggling B-17s, with a flight led by Walter Krupinski, who scored a kill and a “probable” on this mission and actually collided with—or more accurately “bounced”—his victims. The P-47 was a claimed “probable” but not a confirmed kill accredited to him. His Me 262 survived the initial impact with the wreckage of the bomber, damaging the fighter, but then he took hits from another P-47.{11} Despite not having all of his records due to being captured at the end of the war, he recalled the event:
“Galland had shot a bomber earlier, but I did not see any hits, and then I fired on one, and then another fell, I saw this, but when I fired my bomber was smoking, only damaged. I had been hit by their gunfire, and my left engine was sputtering, the canopy had a large hole in both sides, the bullet had just passed behind my head, the armor seat under me felt as if a rabid dog was shaking it. It literally saved my ass. I then fired on a P-47 that was within range crossing in front of me, and he slowed to a stall, and we collided. It was a glancing blow, I bounced off. He fell away but I was fine. I did not know if he managed to get away, I did not see that, so I did not claim a kill.”{12}