Junkers 88 Last Stand! Crashed German Bomber Wouldn't Surrender

[Music] in the vast majority of cases in world war ii when allied or axis aircraft were shot down the pilots and their crew generally surrendered on reaching the ground even though routinely armed with pistols resistance was after all probably pointless as enemy troops or civilians arrived in large numbers to take the downed airmen prisoner with the exception of u.s airmen shot down over japan most aircrew were treated reasonably well by the other side and could expect to be taken prisoner according to the terms of the geneva convention and after interrogation sent to a prisoner of war camp but in one extraordinary episode from the battle of britain in 1940 combat actually occurred on the ground between the crew of a crash german bomber and british troops sent to take them prisoner the battle of britain was the huge aerial conflict during the summer of 1940 between hitler's luftwaffe and britain's royal air force britain had been pushed off the continent of europe in june 1940 with the defeat and retreat of her british expeditionary force and a large part of the french army overwhelmed by the new german tactic of blitzkrieg several hundred thousand british and french soldiers were then successfully evacuated to the uk from the french port of dunkirk in northern france in an incredible operation britain now braced herself for a likely german invasion the whole populous mobilized to carry out prime minister winston churchill's famous exhortation to fight them on the beaches and landing grounds the british were determined never to surrender but hitler was just as determined to remove britain from the war the first stage to be achieved before hitler could seriously consider a seaborne invasion of southern england was the gaining of air superiority over the landing areas the raf had to be destroyed primarily the spitfire and hurricane squadrons heavy bombing attacks were made on raf airfields in southern and eastern england almost driving the raf to the wall but the british eventually got the upper hand and a switch in focus from airfields to industrial targets gave the raf some breathing space to regroup and hit back even harder german forces began nighttime attacks on england soon after including a move to bombing london called the blitz [Music] the german bombing squadron kampfgeschwader 77 had converted onto the juncker's ju-88 in mid-july 1940 and in september was based in northern france with 35 aircraft it would hold the record in its group for the most planes lost on a single day's action over england where nine ju-88s were shot down during a disastrous raid on the port town of gravesend in kent on the 18th of september moving forward into night operations from the blitz the squadron launched as part of a large raid on london on the 26th to 27th of september the bomber at the center of this story had a crew of four none of them officers the pilot was under official or corporal fritz roulandt bomb amer feldwebel or sergeant gothard richter radio operator gunner unto officer evin richter no relation to sergeant richter and gunner flieger or private jacob reiner after successfully raiding london the ju-88 had been damaged by anti-aircraft fire over the medway in kent it was intercepted around dawn on the 27th of september by both hurricanes of number 66 squadron and spitfires of number 92 squadron incredibly these fighters did not simply blow the wounded german bomber out of the sky raf pilots had orders to force down any new types of german aircraft that they encountered due to the intelligence value to be gleaned from mostly intact airframes and crewmen the pilots noticed that this particular ju-88 a1 was of one of the new models raf intelligence wanted to examine the raf fighters shot out its remaining good engine rouland crash landed the aircraft on grave in imarsh in kent following the wheels up crash landing rouland and his crew who were mostly uninjured quickly armed themselves the planes in machine guns were still operational and fresh saddle drum magazines were slapped into place an mp38 machine pistol carried aboard for self-defense purposes was also loaded and the men checked their pistols as well it appears that rouland ordered a defense of the plane in order to give his crew time to destroy all sensitive equipment on board and to set special demolition charges that would burn the plane out amongst the equipment on board was the new top secret bza bombsite computer which must not fall into british hands while the germans hurriedly destroyed equipment and prepared weapons british troops were on their way to take them prisoner based on coastal defense duties near to the crash site were some men of a company first battalion london irish rifles billeted in a local pub the crash was clearly heard and 12 men commanded by captain cantifer set out straight away as they approached the crash ju-88 they were met by bursts of fire from the german machine guns and took cover opening fire with their lienfield rivals after several minutes of firing canterfur led some of his men in a flanking movement along a dike and as they closed up to about a hundred yards from the plane a german was seen waving a white handkerchief but the moment the british troops tried to approach they were fired on once more opening a brisk fire the british bullets went through the aircraft's thin metal skin and after a few minutes the germans surrendered disarming the germans the british also located and disarmed a demolition charge that rulant had set to deny his plane to the enemy however a german-speaking british soldier overheard the german airmen discussing a second time bomb set to explode shortly ordering everyone clear and determined to save the precious aircraft from destruction captain cantifer climbed back inside and located a black metal box dragged this out and threw it into a drainage ditch nearby the plane and its new top secret bomb site computer was saved and could be scoured for invaluable intelligence by the british there were no hard feelings towards the luftwaffe crew who were taken to a local pub by the london irish and treated to pine sabir before being handed over to the military police captain canterva received the george medal a high award for gallantry for risking his life to save the junckers 88. this skirmish was important in british history as it was the last armed confrontation between british forces and enemy troops on british soil since the french landing at fishgard in 1797 during the napoleonic wars thanks for watching please subscribe and share and also visit my audiobook channel war stories with mark felton you can also help to support both of my channels at paypal and patreon details in the description box below [Music]

Channel: Mark Felton Productions

Views: 794,654

Rating: 4.9617987 out of 5

Keywords: Mark Felton, Junkers 88, Battle of Britain, Blitz, Luftwaffe, George Medal

Id: bzunVFjYvWk

Length: 8min 4sec (484 seconds)

Published: Wed May 05 2021