Service Historique de l'Armée de l'Air

[Bertrand HUGOT]

SHAA
Service Historique de l'Armée de l'Air

Address

Château de Vincennes
Boite postale 110
00481 ARMEES
FRANCE

01.41.93.33.92

opening hours :

8:30 17:00 Monday to Thursday
8:30 15:00 Friday.

how to join ?

East of Paris. By Metro, line 1 at the terminus, Château de Vincennes, you arrived just at the castle. After to cross the bridge and the porch you turn left alongside a building for arrive in a big entrance hall. In front of you, you will find the "Salle de lecture". Inside this reading room you fill up a document about yourself, then try to find what you want. There are of course a very important documentation about the French squadrons but, there are some Germans documents pick up in 1947. For example in the cardboard 6D31 there are list of Verlust for each gruppe with name of Kommandeur, date of birth and more. All these Germans documents are between 6D7 and 6D31. I have only read this last but I know that in the previous there are order of battles for many unit and gruppe.

Try to have a look inside the index "Correspondance" Cor1 because there are documents sent by other important center of Archivs like BA or PRO.

After to fill the reference of the document you want, archives or books, -one by green ticket- you are waiting about 30 minutes the time that personnel bring you your desideratum. It is better to order before the lunch rather the midday meal. Like there are less and less employees you will have to wait a long time.

Upstairs you can find the photo library (open Monday and Tuesday 8:30 12, wed and Thursday 1330 1700). Photographs are put by aircraft manufactory or in alphabetical order for the persons. Prices for these photos are very cheaper than the ECPA.

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'clock High!:

Many Souffan
Nowakiewicz
Sun Nov 26 15:21:09 2024


Hello Franek, Bonjour Christian-Jacques.

The last week I was at SHAA and I found a List in a file (6 D 4)of 114 Polish fighters who they fought during the battle of France and for Nowakiewiecz in the column of
Observations it's written 6 victories (Included 4 conf.).

Do zobaczenia, A bientôt, see you soon...

Many.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOH!:

Greg S.
Polish fighters
Mon Nov 27 14:47:20 2024


Hello,

>I found a List in a file (6 D 4)of 114 Polish fighters who they fought during the battle of France

I found names of 190 Polish fighter-pilots who fought over France in May - June 1940.

Regards,

Greg

[Richard T Eger]

From TOH!:

Y. Michelet
Good! And...
Mon Nov 27 18:48:05 2024


... in my humble opinion (IMHO) you should send your list to SHAA at Vincennes. They would be glad - they can't know everything either and... they don't speak or read
Polish. Besides, many French people have typically French names* so it's not always easy to make the difference.

* For example soccer (football) star Raymond Kopa in the '50s, ex-minister Poniatowski, alias "Ponia", in all probably several million everywehre. Help, the Poles have
invaded France!

[Richard T Eger]

From TOH!:

Y.M.
Polish not "French" names. Sorry. n/t
Tue Nov 28 08:33:21 2024

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'clock High!:

Theron P. Snell
photograph sources
Sun Dec 31 14:51:35 2024

I am seeking sources of photographs of the following units and airfield, taken in September 1943, before 5 October 1943:

II/KG 100;
I/KG 26;
Istres Airfield

Are there archives that will provide prints?

Thank you.

Theron P. Snell
snell@rli-net.net

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Richard T. Eger
Istres Airfield Photos
Sun Dec 31 23:02:02 2024


Dear Theron,

For aerial photos, go to the LWAG website (lwag.org) topic "Air Photo Archive Keele University, Staffordshire, UK" in the forum "Archives in the UK &
Ireland". For ground photos of Istres Airfield you might try many of the topics in the forum "Archives in France". You also might also want to contact the forum moderator
Bertrand HUGOT for his advice.

Regards,
Richard

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

bertrand H
Istres airfleld
Mon Jan 1 11:23:55 2024


Dear Theron,

Like Richard has explained, go to the LWAG website (lwag.org) and in the forum "Archives in France" I have written that you can find aerial photograhs taken in the south of France at the "Aérophotothèque" of the university of Aix en Provence :
Aérophotothèque
Centre Camille Jullian
rue Château de l'Horloge
F-13100 Aix en Provence
FRANCE
mocci@mmsh.univ-aix.fr

More, French Historical Center (Service historique de l'armée de l'air) has some "objectives reports" in its archivs and I invite you to contact them to know if they are some aerial pictures of Istres airfields.
Sincerely

Bertrand H

[Richard T Eger]

From within a thread on 12 O'Clock High!:

H-E
French "pilot's notes"?
Thu Feb 26 17:48:28 2024
195.93.74.19

The e-mail address of the Service historique de l'Armée de l'Air (SHAA) reads :

shaa@claranet.fr

Please tell me if does not work, I'll invistigate. It should work.

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'Clock High!:

KEITH KUTTESCH
B-17F SERIAL # 42-20302
Tue Jun 8, 2024 18:38
205.188.117.11

ON 6TH SEPT 1943 ON IT'S WAS BACK FROM A BOMBING MISSION TO STUTTGART. B-17F # 42-30203, NICK NAMED "SHACK-UP", WAS SHOT DOWN BY GERMAN FIGHTERS, BELIEVED TO BE ME-109'S.
3 MEN FELL IN GOUDRAY, FRANCE.
2 WERE PICKED UP IN THE VICINITY OF MANCHECURT,
AND 1 LANDED ON THE TERRITORY OF BOULANCOURT, FRANCE.

TO MY KNOWLEDGE ALL 10 MEN BAILED OUT. 8 FOR SURE. 6 SURVIVED. 3 WERE CAPTURED AND 3 OTHERS ESCAPED WITH THE HELP OF THE LOCAL FRENCH RESISTANCE. DOES ANYONE HAVE ANY INFORMATION AS TO WHICH GERMAN FIGHTER PILOT MIGHT HAVE SHOT THIS B-17 DOWN, AND WHERE THE B-17 ACTUAL CRASH SITE MIGHT BE? 4 MEN DISAPPEARED. I AM ATTEMPTING TO FIND THE CRASH SITE AND IF POSSIBLE THE 4 MISSING MEN. IF ANYONE CAN HELP ME, PLEASE EMAIL ME AT.

KDKUTT@AOL.COM

THANK YOU,

KEITH...

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Anonymous
Re: B-17F SERIAL # 42-20302
Tue Jun 8, 2024 21:49
217.123.103.125

Try National Archives at College Park, Maryland. Record Group 242, German crash reports. They have records with the names of German pilots and Flak units, that shot down allied a/c.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Rabe Anton
Loss of Boeing B-17 s/n 42-20302
Tue Jun 8, 2024 22:32
132.60.240.80

I do not intend to be rude to "Anonymous" nor to dash your hopes, but the National Archives and Records Admininstration (NARA) has no means of locating helpful records from the information that you have. Period. You will be wasting your time and that of its staff by making an inquiry.

Believe me, there are only two possible sources that can help you, and neither is very promising:

(1) U.S. Army Individual Deceased Personnel Files (IDPF, or "293 Files") for the four missing members of the B-17 crew. These records may be obtained by application to the U.S. Army Human Resources Command, Alexandria, Virginia. The case files must be retrieved from the National Archives, thus it will take several weeks to receive an answer. The IDPF may contain one page or quite a number of pages; the files vary a great deal in quantity and quality of information. Given what you have indicated about this case and implied about your research, I am not optimistic that the IDPF will help you, as the U.S. Army seems not to have recovered remains; nonetheless you virtually have no choice but to try the IDPF.

(2) I suppose it is conceivable that the wreckage of B-17 s/n 42-20302 may have been discovered and recorded outside of U.S. channels, e.g., by local French civilians who found the site, in which instance the Service Historique de l'Armée de l'Air, Château de Vincennes, Paris, France, might conceivably be able to help. I think, however, that the chances of this are minute. Essentially, if the remains of the crew were not located and recovered in the great Graves Registration sweep of 1945-1947, there is little chance that they can be found today. Possibly, but very improbably.

You might be interested to know that HQ European Theatre of Operations, P/W and X Branch, Military Intelligence Service, Escape and Evasion Report No. 482 covers the cases of Shilliday and Marean; Hasson apparently escaped to Spain and was repatriated but there is no individual escape report for him.

Horrido!
RA

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Laurent Rizzotti
B-17F SERIAL # 42-20302
Wed Jun 9, 2024 10:44
62.34.204.250


I doubt you can find the German pilot(s) responsible, as tens of bombers were claimed over France this day.

What is your source ? Especially regarding the French Resistance. The story of the escape of the 3 survivors is probably in one of the numerous books over the French Resistance (each french "departement" has tens of books written).

As for searching in the French archives, I don't think you can find something in the "Service historique de l'Air" about crashes in France in 1943. My bet would be to search the archives of the "Gendarmerie" (the French country police, a branch of the military), that was active in France in 43, contrary to the airforce, and was responsible for investigating the air crashes.
Try to contact the "Service Historique de l'Armée de Terre, Château de Vincennes, Paris, France". Same address as for the Air Force, only the service name is different.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

KEITH KUTTESCH
ATTN. LAURENT RIZZOTTI...
Wed Jun 9, 2024 16:15
205.188.116.79

DEAR LAURENT,
PLEASE EMAIL ME. I HAVE A LOT OF INFORMATION ABOUT THE FRENCH RESISTANCE THAT HELPED MY UNCLE AND 2 OTHER MEN. THEY WERE TAKEN TO A DR MAYS' HOUSE FOR HIDING. EMAIL ME AND I WILL FILL YOU IN ON MORE. HOPEFULLY, AND MAYBE YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO FURNISH ME WITH SOME MORE INFORMATION.

THANK YOU,

KEITH...

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'Clock High!:

KEITH KUTTESCH
B-17F SERIAL #42-30203.NOT 20243
Wed Jun 9, 2024 00:09
205.188.117.11

I AM SORRY, WHEN I POSTED MY MESSAGE I MADE A MISTAKE. THE AIRCRAFT B-17F SERIAL@ 42-30203..NOT 20243. I AM SORRY FOR THIS MISTAKE....... THANK YOU R A FOR YOUR RESPONSE

KEITH...

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Tom Davis
B-17 #42-30203
Wed Jun 9, 2024 08:43
64.12.116.210

Keith,

B-17 #42-30203 was assigned to the 388th Bomb Group, 560th Squadron, and you may get help by contacting http://www.388thbg.org/ .

Tom