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This page contains photos and backround informations of airplanes and family members  from the time of WWI ,WWII and up to now, which came mostly from my personal collection.

I started my personal research in our family history and found several old albums of the time from about 1917 when my grandfather was serving for the 'Fliegertruppe'  of  'Kaiser Wilhelm'  the german emperor.

The majority of the pictures came from my personal family archives, some are of other origins.

After finding some new documents about my grandfathers military carreer (in the cellar of my fathers house), i decided, that it is time for an update of the page - not because of new fotos, but because of new informations.

My grandfather, at this time Leutnant Adolf Genth , tooks part  as an aircraft commander (bombardier, frontgunner, observer) in attacks against England in WWI with Gotha GIV - bombers from Kagohl 3 (Kagohl means : Kampfgeschwader der Obersten Heeresleitung).

He was born in South Africa (Braamfontain , Kr. Transvaal, which is in the aera of Johannesburg) in 1894 because my great - grandfather had left Germany for making his luck there with a wood producing farm (the name was ' Frankenwald ' - is there anything left of it ? - we have also an album with fotos from those days and some relicts of this time, it would be nice if somebody living there now would contact me).

Meanwhile i learned, that a part of the town Johannesburg is  still today called ' Frankenwald', the place belongs now to a university.

The family stayed in South Africa until the boers war was over and the british troops won.

After that, my great grandfather saw no sence in staying there any longer and left the country for Germany in 1902.

My grandfather was brought in 1905 (only 11 years old !!) to the ' Kadettenkorps Oranienstein '. A place for military education.

At the 10 th of August 1914 he became Leutnant of the 4 th Magdeburger Infanterie Regiment No. 67 and was sent - a little later - to the western front.

He was wounded three times severly (one of his brothers died 1914 near Verdun).

After being wounded for the third time, he was sent to a new task, - become an observer in the new german ' Fliegertruppe'.

He started his aviation carreer at the Fea 9 (Flieger-Ersatz-Abteilung) in Darmstadt. After some weeks he changed to the Fea 6 at Grossenhain until he was finally sent to the Halbgeschwader I (10th October 1916) and then in the end of 1916 came to the Bombengeschwader III (the famous ' Englandgeschwader').

He flew a.o. 13 attacks against the british isle,and downed 3 british planes, one Handley Page 0/100 (the counterpart of the Gotha GIV) and two fighters.

For that he received in 1918 the Ritterkreuz (knight cross) of the ' Kgl. Hausorden von Hohenzollern mit Schwertern' and served in 1918 as 'Adjutant' of the BOGOHL III (Bombengeschwader III).   

Even after the end of world war I, he was still serving for Germany , protecting the frontiers of the eastern parts in 1919 against russian and polish demands with the ' Artilleriefliegerabteilung 120' in Lyck (east prussia).His old comrad W.Aschoff from the former BG III - asked him to join (look at the book ' Londonfluege 1917' that A. wrote).

After the treaty of Versailles draw the new borders, he has to face the fact, that everything they tried was in vain and left this place and became 'demobilization  officier' - a maybe not so nice job for him....

The following pictures are mostly from the western front (Belgium,France).

If somebody should have some interesting informations about units,men airplanes or other things of interest, feel free to contact me. I am specially interested in the fate of Lt. Radke, the pilot my grandfather flew with. so please : contact me !

But lucky enough he survived the first world war and  - after some years trying to work in other jobs (up to Greece) he joined again the new Luftwaffe in August 1st 1934.

His first commando in this new german Luftwaffe was as Staffelkapitaen II. Kampfgeschwader 153 in Finsterwalde (my father told me they flew with the Junkers Ju 86 aircrafts with Diesel - engines.

He than became a member of the Generalstab and  - in the 12th of December 1939 chief of the IV. Flieger-Korps.

After an emergency landing of a Me108 in Mechelen (Belgium) after loosing orientation in bad weather - with two german officers and very important plans concerning the planned attacks against the west on board - he was sent to the western front as a commander of the I (June 6th 1940 ) and finaly commander of  III. KG 76 (July 19th 1940).

He died after an attack of british Spifires overhead the street of Dover in July 1940 during an observer mission in a Dornier Do17 z . The british pilot was F/O Patrick Woods-Scawen (85 Sqdrn.), who died only some weeks later (1 September 1940) because his parachute didn't open after a dogfight with a german Me109.

My father Karl Georg Genth served for the german Luftwaffe from 1944 to 1945 - his age at that time 20 years.

He flew for the III JG26 (squadron) Me109 and FW190 fighters and managed it even in these bad times to shoot down two british aircraft a Spitfire and a Hawker Tempest (and he told me he survived several combats with american fighters as well  f.e. with P47 and P51 - the main problem at those day's for a young unexpierenced german pilot was to survive until the next day!).

The pressure from the allied air forces were very strong and so it happened in march 7th 1945, that he was downed and severly wounded by a british Hawker Tempest from the 3 rd Sqdn of the RAF  in the vicinity of Enschede (Netherlands)  , he flew a  ' long - nosed ' FW190 - D9. yellow 15 - Werknummer 500118.

We own a copy of the combat report of the british pilot named Vasiliades (- sounds greek to me, if somebody of his relatives read this please contact me - the pilot himself was - according to some report -  killed in action a few weeks later....). Additional to that there is a combat report of another english pilot chasing my father Fl/Lt. Smith 80 Sqdn - which has a similiar content.

A very rare story happened also in 1985, when my father was invited by Adri Roding (Enschede) to see the rests of his FW190  and talk to the eyewhitnesses of his parachute jump - exactly 40 years after this happened (see a netherland newspaper article of this day) - i say thanks for that again.

Funny enough (see the report) , the british pilots nicknamed the german pilots ' huns ' - in my opinion a not very correct description - from the racial point of view my father looked more like the northern type (not up to the north pole - but you know what i mean).

For the germans every british soldier  was a ' tommy ' sounds to me a little bit more sympatic  like ' hun'  but i honestly have to declare that i don't  know a ' hun ' up to now -  and maybe they are ok !

By the way did you know, that the british island was settled by people from germany ? (- a little historic note - must be !)

The ' Angeln and Sachsen' tribes coming from northern germany - setteled down there and found in the end their own country  - England (i shocked my british pilot - captain Gary Charles Roberts -  in Mexico with this news, but as far as i know it's true ?! - sorry for that Gary !!!).

But now let's change to something completely different !

Ironically my father flew later the Hawker Seafury (target tower)  for the new german army  - the successor of the Tempest which downed him some years before.

Now have a look at the pictures from two world wars and take them as they are - a document of the past ! - it was not my intention to support special political views  of any kind, i am just interested in the true history !

Times today are - thank god - much more pleasant (in Europe - but like the example of the former Yougoslavia shows, also here they will need a strong airforce for the future!)

T. Genth   Muenster (Germany) September 7th 2001

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  Let's Start

       

Original drawing from theAlbum ' Kriegserinnerungen 1917 ' of Adolf Genth

Content:

Photoalbum WW2 ........

Modern times ........

- Links  

                                             

All copyrights of the pictures will stay with me - requests for using will be given if possible - don't 'webnapp' ... or you will be napped !!!!!.

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