guys/gals the last work mentioned is going to be one book you do not want to miss. Over 1000 German pilot bios not to mention his cross referencing of German night fighter kills to actual RAF bomber command losses. A must have.
probably out this summer I would imagine and I am jealous of my European friends as they will have the hot book in their little hands before yours truly. Friend R. McKenzie has been working on his huge database of 1945 missions for some years and available to Dr. Boiten for this massive tome......
Perhaps it's a good idea to give you an update of both my book 'Battles with the Nachtjagd' and my current project 'The Nachtjagd War Diaries'. The former book is somewhat similar to my earlier work 'Battles with the Luftwaffe', and mainly focuses on the human experience of the night airwar over the Third Reich in WWII. The book, which I have written together with my friend Martin Bowman, has been published by Schiffer in the USA in October 2006, and is fully illustrated with over 400 photos, many of them previously unpublished. I must add that the background narrative for 'Battles with the Nachtjagd' is based on my knowledge of the Nachtjagd of between 4 and 2 years ago, when Martin and I basically wrote this manuscript.
Since completing 'Battles with the Nachtjagd', I have been working non-stop on 'The Nachtjagd War Diaries' and have expanded enormously in my knowledge of the operational history of the German night fighter force in WWII. 'The Nachtjagd War Diaries' will comprise a fresh and thorough documentation of the Nachtjagd claims against the western Allied air forces in WWII (separate chapters on the Nachtjagd on the Eastern Front, Mediterranean and S.E. Europe are still under construction for inclusion in a second edition of the book). Using virtually ALL available archival evidence, the book will give detailed summaries/narratives for the Nachtjagd effort on every night when the Nachtjagd operated against the Allied air forces in the West. In this respect, the book is of a similar type as Martin Middlebrook's Bomber Command War Diaries, but my book will be fully illustrated with 240 photos, most of these previously unpublished and coming from the photo albums of Nachtjagd veteransand, and will also contain some 100 personal stories of former Nachtjäger that I have interviewed during the course of my research.
For the writing of the nightly summaries, I have used all the available German archival material (such as the surviving War Diaries of the 1st Jagdkorps of large parts of 1943 and 1944, Lageberichte der Wehrmachtsbefehlshaber in den Niederlanden (Weekly War Situation Reports for The Netherlands) 1940-1943 and the Tagesmeldungen/Abschussmeldungen (daily reports/victory claims reports) of Luftgau Kommando Holland 1941-43 and the virtually complete KTB XI Luftgau Kommando (Hamburg) 1940-1945 (covering N.W. Germany, Schleswig-Holstein, and Denmark throughout the war), several (unofficial) flying unit war diaries and unit Abschuss listings covering parts of the war (of I., II., III./NJG1 and IV./NJG1, II./NJG2, III./NJG4, III./NJG5, Stab NJG6, I. and III./NJG11), the namentliche Verlustmeldungen (Personal Loss Cards) of NJG1, NJG2, NJG3, NJG4, NJG5, NJG6, NJG7, NJGr.10, NJG11, NJG101 and NJG102, originating from the Wehrmacht Auskunft Stelle (WASt) in Berlin, Flugbücher (Flying Log Books), Leistungsbücher (Log of Achievements), Gefechtsberichte & Abschussmeldungen (Personal Combat Reports), and Abschussliste (listing of claims for aircraft destroyed) of around 140 Nachtjagd veterans. In addition to this original German material, I also use a wide variety of Allied (mainly RAF Bomber Command) Intelligence material about the developments in the German night fighter force, especially during 1943-45. The research and writing of the nightly summaries has been made possible with the support of a small army of fellow airwar researchers around the globe, including excellent men such as Rod Mackenzie of New Zealand, who is also active on this forum.
The manuscript of 'The Nachtjagd War Diaries' is much bigger than'Battles with the Nachtjagd' and also inclused an appendix giving short biographies of all Nachtjagd pilots with one or more victories (the count is now at 1174 individual entries). One of the aims of this book is to match the individual Nachtjagd claims against Allied (mainly Bomber Command) aircraft losses throughout the war. I have managed to make an estimated 90-95 % complete matching in the period of 1940 - mid 1943. The research and writing of 'The Nachtjagd War Diaries' has now been virtually completed -I will deliver the manuscript plus maps/photos etc to Red Kite publishing in the UK (
Red Kite Books) this weekend.
I hope that this info on my two current books about the night airwar is of interest to the readers of this forum!
Cheers, Theo
T.B.'s latest on the Nachtjäger vs Bomber Command 
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