On June 27 Gabreski downed a Bf-109 to match Bob Johnson’s score, and on July 5 he shot down another Messerschmitt near Evreaux. So Gabreski had 28 aerial kills (and 2 1/2 on the ground) and the ETO had a new high scorer. But like Johnson before him, ‘Gabby’ was nearing the end of his tour. On his last day, July 20, he took time off from a ramrod to Frankfurt to strafe Bassinheim Airfield and set a parked Heinkel bomber afire. ‘At that time our policy was to make one pass on an airdrome and get out,’ he recalled, ‘because the flak gunners were always ready and waiting if you tried to come back for more. But I figured the flak had been so light that I could get away with another pass.’

Coming back in right down on the deck, Gabreski saw his tracers pass over another He-111. Without thinking, he dropped the nose–and the P-47’s big paddle prop clipped the ground. With no hope of returning to England, Gabreski bellied into a wheat field and was captured. (He went on to fly North American F-86 Sabre jets over Korea–as Mahurin’s commanding officer–downing 6 1/2 MiGs.)

Of the 56th’s original aces, only Zemke and Schilling remained. Offered command of the 479th Fighter Group–P-38 Lightnings–Schilling refused (’Hell no, not P-38s’) and was stunned when Zemke took it instead. ‘There was only one group Dave wanted…and deserved to command,’ said Zemke. ‘And for me there was need of a new challenge, a new purpose…[but]…behind me was the greatest command of my service life.’ (By giving up his P-47, Zemke shortened his war. He scored two kills with the 479th, bringing his final aerial tally to 17 3/4, but on October 30, on escort duty over Germany, the North American P-51 Mustang he was flying that day came apart in a thunderstorm. Zemke got out safely, only to be captured.)

Zemke’s departure marked the Wolfpack’s darkest chapter. On September 17 the group was handed the dirtiest ground-attack work of all: anti-aircraft suppression in support of the ill-fated Allied airborne invasion of Holland (Operation Market Garden). In two days of dueling with flak sites, Schilling’s men took out 34 emplacements, but 17 P-47s were destroyed and a dozen damaged. Two pilots became prisoners-of-war and four were killed. The group’s old nemesis, JG 26, got through the dazed P-47 pilots the next day to knock down 17 helpless troop transports.

Fortunately, October 1944 was a quiet time for the Eighth Air Force. The Luftwaffe was saving its precious planes and fuel reserves for the grosse Schlag–the ‘Great Blow,’ or Ardennes offensive, in which the Germans hoped to prevent the invasion of their fatherland. As they planned, foul weather initially curtailed Allied fighter cover. Not until December 23 could Schilling lead his men over the battleground, where he lost track of two consecutive enemy formations in the clouds. He angrily took his ground controllers to task, and they replied, ‘Don’t worry about it! There’s bigger game on this heading!’

There was. A large enemy formation was located below and 40-plus more were flying ahead, including new Focke-Wulf Fw-190D ‘long-nosed’ high-altitude fighters. Sending the 61st and 63rd down to attack the Germans below, Schilling brought the 62nd around behind the group that was ahead. ‘I managed to hit the right rear Me-109 with about a 20-degree deflection shot at a range of about 700 yards,’ Schilling recalled. As the Messerschmitt dropped off, Schilling moved up on the next in line, setting it afire. ‘I then picked another and fired at about 1,000 yards and missed as he broke right and started to dive for the deck. At about 17,000 feet I had closed to about 500 yards and fired, resulting in a heavy concentration of strikes, and the pilot bailed out.’

Now separated from his flight, Schilling spotted 35 to 40 Focke-Wulfs circling 1,000 feet below him. ‘I repeated the same tactics as before and attacked one from about 500 yards range.’ As the Fw-190 went spinning downward, Schilling latched onto a fifth, which put up more of a fight: ‘He immediately took violent evasive action, and it took me several minutes of maneuvering to get in a position to fire. I fired from about 300 yards above and to the left, forcing me to pull through him and fire as he went out of sight over the cowling….The pilot immediately bailed out.’

Hooking up with a stray 63rd Squadron pilot, Schilling looked for a sixth kill, but when his wingman was attacked he broke off to help him out. Both escaped. When all the gun-camera film was sorted out later, the Wolfpack had chalked up its best day ever–34 enemy aircraft destroyed. Their tally now stood at more than 800–25 percent of the Eighth Air Force total. (Schilling, who was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, soon moved up to join 65th Wing Headquarters, finishing the war as a full colonel with 22 1/2 aerial and 11 1/2 ground kills.)

After that, the 56th’s only real challengers in the air were the new Messerschmitt Me-262 jet fighters. The Wolfpack had downed jets before with lucky passing shots or by catching them over their runways. They had stuck with the Jug when all other groups went to P-51s, and were the sole recipients of the P-47M–upengined to produce 465 mph (more speed than a Mustang)–with which they could handle combat on the jets’ terms. On April 5, 1945, a Wolfpack pilot actually ran down a 262 in a shallow dive. Attempting to outturn the P-47, the German pilot was cut off and shot down.

On April 13, the second anniversary of its first combat mission, the Wolfpack celebrated by savaging Eggebeck Airdrome. Coming across the field at 400 to 450 mph, they fired more than 78,000 rounds of .50 caliber, destroying 91 enemy aircraft where they sat and becoming the first Eighth Air Force group to surpass the magic number–1,000 destroyed.

Later that score was reduced, but the 56th Fighter Group finished the war with 992 1/2 confirmed kills, including 664 1/2 in the air, more than any other Eighth Air Force fighter group. Furthermore, the 56th scored 58 probables and 543 damaged in the air and on the ground. At war’s end a P-47M was exhibited under the Eiffel Tower, its nose emblazoned with the legend: Zemke’s Wolfpack, 56th Fighter Group, 1,000 Enemy Aircraft Destroyed!

‘A fighter pilot must possess an inner urge for combat,’ Zemke said. ‘The will at all times to be offensive will develop into his own tactics. I stay with an enemy until either he’s destroyed, I’m out of ammunition, he evades into the clouds, or I’m too low on gasoline to continue the combat.’

---

This article was written by Don Hollway and originally published in the September 1999 issue of Aviation History Magazine.

For more great articles subscribe to Aviation History magazine today!

Pages: 1 2 3