Subsequent investigation established that this had been caused by a small explosion on board the aircraft, although there were no signs of a fire. It was also found that the vital safety hook had not been secured properly. When Franz had thrown himself out of the cockpit, his parachute harness had come undone. His death, the enquiry concluded, had been brought about solely as a result of his own negligence.

On 2 May 1943, three months into my time at Nancy, I finally got my hands on a Messerschmitt Me 109. Admittedly, it was only a Dora, the obsolete and relatively unsophisticated Me 109D variant with a 700hp Junkers Jumo 210 liquid-cooled engine, but even this early example of the type was an absolute revelation. Just to sit in its cockpit, which seemed sculpted to accommodate the human form with not a centimetre of superfluous space to spare, to look out through that tiny windscreen over the impossibly long engine cowling, gave the pilot the feeling of being at one with the aircraft–that man and machine were a single lethal organic entity.

The only weak point in the design of the Me 109–and this afflicted not just the Dora, but every other variant of the breed as well–was the spindly, knock-kneed undercarriage. Take-offs and landings, the latter in particular, called for the utmost concentration on the part of the pilot. When speed was reduced after touchdown, the Me 109 showed a marked tendency to swing to the left due to the reverse torque of the propeller. If the pilot did not act in time to correct this swing, it could all too easily develop into a fully blown ground loop, which invariably resulted in the undercarriage legs being sheared off.

Take-offs presented slightly less of a problem. The answer was to do a ‘tail-dragger’. If all three wheels were kept on the ground for as long as possible, the combined effect of the tail wheel and the increasing pressure of the slipstream on the rudder were enough to compensate for the torque effect. But the pilot then had to display a fine sense of judgement for the feel of the aircraft as it lifted off. Torque could also prove deadly if the pilot had the misfortune to overshoot on landing. If he was trying to go round again, but shoved the throttle forward too abruptly while the aircraft was hanging in the air, its speed too low and with insufficient lift, the sudden torque could flip the machine over onto its back–almost always with fatal consequences for the unfortunate occupant.

But once these foibles had been explained to us and accorded their due respect, the Me 109 proved an absolute joy to fly. It was light on the controls and extremely responsive. The only exception was in a fast dive, when the stick had to be kept pushed fully forward. This required a considerable amount of brute force. The pupil pilot was also strongly advised not to exceed the machine’s stability limit–the point at which he could expect to see the wings part company with the rest of the airframe and wrap themselves round his ears!

After the Dora we progressed first to the Me 109E Emil, which was powered by a 1,100hp Daimler-Benz DB 601A, and then on to the more aerodynamically refined Me 109F Friedrich with its uprated DB 601E, before finally being entrusted with the Me 109G Gustav. This latter, powered by a 1,500hp DB 605 engine, was, at that time, the latest variant of Professor Messerschmitt’s famous design and currently the Luftwaffe’s standard front-line fighter. We at JG 107 had been presented with a grand total of two Gustavs.

As well as being used for training purposes, this prized pair had to be kept at operational readiness in case there was an emergency scramble. For by now, as well as the occasional RAF reconnaissance Mosquito passing by high overhead, allied Jabos, or fighter-bombers, were beginning to poke their noses down towards our corner of France. This gave added impetus to our air-to-air gunnery practice. But not once did an enemy aircraft deign to show itself in front of our Revi gunsights.

And so we continued to revel unmolested in the freedom of the early summer skies, throwing our machines about with still youthful abandon and indulging in exciting games of chase against a backdrop of majestic and ever-changing cloudscapes. I remember on one occasion flying between two enormous cumulus clouds and finding myself above a field of pristine white, some 100 metres across and 500 metres long, which sloped gently upwards to end in a magnificent celestial arch where the two clouds met and intertwined. I could not resist the temptation to perform a slow roll just above the floor of this aerial valley before exiting through the arch and pulling into a steep turn through the clear cobalt sky that surrounded the whole mighty edifice.

In addition to the Me 109, the two Staffeln of JG 107 based at Nancy–2./JG 107 operated separately out of Toul just over twenty-five kilometres to the west of us–also had several foreign aircraft on strength for training sessions. These were mostly ex-French air force machines, including two fighter types, the radial-engined Bloch 151 and the liquid-cooled Dewoitine D.520, both of which had seen brief service during the Battle of France. There were also the Potez 63 and the NAA-64. I was not qualified to fly the twin-engined Potez, but I did go up a number of times in the North American NAA-64, a two-seat trainer ordered by the French government from the United States before the war.

But the jewel in the crown, perhaps, was my brief hop in an RAF Spitfire. I cannot recall the exact variant, but I believe it was said at the time that it was an example captured intact and shipped back from North Africa. My immediate impression was that the cockpit was a trifle too roomy to let the pilot feel at one with the machine, although that may simply have been my unfamiliarity with it. But otherwise its performance, particularly its ability to turn, was impressive.

At the end of June 1943 I completed my training at Nancy and fondly imagined that, together with my fellow course members, I would now be posted to a front-line fighter unit. But Hauptmann Sommer informed me that I had been selected to serve as an auxiliary fighter instructor, and that I would therefore have to remain at Nancy for a few months longer. This news prompted mixed feelings. On the one hand, I could not suppress a certain measure of pride at this tacit acknowledgement of my flying abilities. But, on the other, I would gladly have foregone this accolade if it meant instead being transferred to the front to begin real operational flying. In hindsight, the order to remain at Nancy very probably increased my life expectancy to a considerable extent.

Within a month, despite my total lack of operational experience, my position as an instructor with JG 107 was made quasi official and I was given charge of a group of about ten trainees. This allowed me ample opportunity to fly, which I used to the full. The regulations at that time specified that an instructor was permitted to fly no more than four hours a day. I interpreted this rule rather loosely to mean four hours per day on average. Thus, after any period of ‘QBI’–‘weather unfit for flying’, which restricted us to the classroom–I would make up my supposed flying hours by putting in more time in the air during the days that followed. This worked well for a while, but then got me into serious trouble.

One Monday, after a prolonged spell of rain, I clocked up ten training flights, each lasting a full hour. The next day it was eight, and on the Wednesday six. This made a total of twenty-four flying hours over the three days, whereas officially only twelve were allowed. The entire three days had been spent on the Arado Ar 66, a placid little biplane with a landing speed of some 70km/h. But on the Thursday I was scheduled to introduce my charges to the Ar 96, a more powerful and altogether far less forgiving machine, whose landing speed was nearly twice as fast.

While coming in to land after the first of that day’s training flights, my mind was fully occupied by the points I needed to get across to the pupils at debriefing. Out of sheer habit I automatically brought the machine down as if still at the controls of an Ar 66. The inevitable result was that my ‘crate’ ran out of lift while still five metres off the ground. It fell to earth with an almighty wallop, bounced a couple of times, and ended up standing on its nose; a classic ‘Fliegerdenkmal’, or ‘airman’s monument’, as it was known in the Luftwaffe–and all in plain view of the Geschwaderkommodore.

Horrified, I could scarcely take in at first what had happened. But there was nothing for it; the blame was mine and mine alone. I tried to put as brave a face on things as possible as I clambered carefully out of the cockpit–only to slip and end up on my backside on the ground. The first person to arrive on the scene was the Schirrmeister, the flight sergeant in charge of the workshops, who came pedalling up like fury on his bicycle.

It obviously hadn’t registered with him that there was nobody else about. “The arsehole who did this deserves a bloody good smack in the gob, Herr Leutnant,” he raged. But when I pointed out that the orifice in question was the one standing in front of him, he calmed down considerably. I may have escaped a smack in the gob, but the official consequences of my accident were not so easily avoided. Charged under Para. 92 of the disciplinary code for damaging Luftwaffe property and failing to observe regulations, I was confined to my quarters for three days and had one-third of my flying pay docked for a period of three months.

Fortunately, I was able to redeem myself somewhat a few weeks later with a nifty, if involuntary piece of flying. I had been detailed to act as wingman to one of the other instructors, a Leutnant with a lot of operational experience under his belt, as that day’s readiness Rotte. Our orders were to stand by, prepared to take off in the unit’s two Me 109Gs if the alarm was raised–which is precisely what happened when a high-flying British Mosquito reconnaissance aircraft was reported to be in the area.

As it was an emergency scramble we taxied directly from dispersal straight out across the field, with me keeping station some fifty metres to the side of, and slightly behind my number one. After the recent long spell of hot weather the surface of the field was almost bare of grass and bone dry. Red flares were going up to warn all other aircraft to keep their distance. But, unknown to us, one of the trainees flying solo in an Ar 66 had failed to notice all the excitement and was coming in to land diagonally across our path.

By this time we were accelerating rapidly. The tail of my machine was already off the ground. I wasn’t tail-dragging because I wanted as much forward visibility as possible over the engine cowling. Not that it did me much good, as I was enveloped in the thick cloud of dust being thrown up by my leader. But suddenly, at the very last moment, I caught a glimpse of a shadowy shape bearing down on me from the right. Instinctively I yanked the stick back into my stomach, at the same time grabbing for the undercarriage retraction lever.

Luckily for me, the Gustav had just enough speed to leave the ground–I must have cleared the Arado by a matter of centimetres at most–but my machine was labouring along left wing low and I hadn’t a hope of climbing away. I continued across the field in this attitude until I felt the speed begin to build up. Only then could I bring the aircraft back on to the straight and level and start slowly to gain altitude. In the event, it was all to no avail. When we finally got up to 10,000 metres, the reported height of the Mosquito, there wasn’t a thing to be seen.

One day in August Hauptmann Sommer dropped another bombshell. I was to train a group of twenty Bulgarian pilots to fly the Dewoitine D.520. I have to admit that this French fighter was the only aircraft that I ever actively disliked. It had none of the good-natured qualities of the Messerschmitt and was an altogether malicious beast. Take your eye off the airspeed indicator for a single second, dare to drop a fraction below minimum speed and–without the slightest warning–the Dewoitine would immediately stall, tip over on to its left wing and whip into a spin.

Admittedly, recovery was not all that difficult, but it required a good 1,000 metres to get it back on to an even keel. It also had a mind of its own on the ground, and taxiing was an art in itself. The mainwheel airbrakes were controlled by two separate pushbuttons and a pilot’s inexperience could be judged by the amount of drunken weaving about he did as he taxied to and from dispersal.

The Bulgarians proved themselves to be extremely competent flyers, however–although their individualistic behaviour, not to say downright indiscipline in the air left a lot to be desired. After a couple of weeks I had got to the stage where I considered each of them fully capable of ferrying a Dewoitine back to Bulgaria. The flight was to be led by their Luftwaffe liaison officer, Hauptmann Hermann Hollweg, and I was ordered to accompany them as a sort of glorified ‘dogsbody-cum-refuse collector’, tagging along to gather up any stragglers who fell by the wayside and escort them to their destination in the wake of the main flock. After taking delivery of twenty-two fresh Dewoitines from the Toulouse factory, we were ready for the off. For me the flight down to Bulgaria promised to be a very welcome break, not to say a minor adventure. But it was not exactly a pleasure trip the whole way.

In fact, we hit the first snag even before leaving the ground at Nancy. Two of the machines simply refused to start. I had previously decided that I would always be the last to take off in order to be able to help out in case of just such an emergency. This turned out to be absolutely the right thing to do, both now and further down the line. Despite my aversion to the Dewoitine, I had amassed quite a bit of experience on the type and we soon had the engines running. The three of us then took off to chase after the others.

Our final destination was the airfield at Karlovo, some 150 kilometres to the southeast of the Bulgarian capital, Sofia. The flight was to be made in three stages, with overnight stops at Wiener Neustadt and Belgrade on the way. Shortly after leaving Nancy my two free-spirited Bulgarians began to wander about all over the sky. We had no radio contact with each other, and so I had no means of stopping them swooping down to poke their noses into the occasional Black Forest valley or whatever else happened to catch their interest. One moment they would be in reasonably close contact with me; the next they were so far away that I would be afraid of losing sight of them altogether.

But as we crossed the River Inn and approached the Alps, the weather began to close in threateningly. And–lo and behold–suddenly there they both were, anxiously tucked in behind me like a couple of chicks behind a mother hen. We sneaked in to Wiener Neustadt just ahead of the bad weather front and enjoyed a convivial evening in the mess with the main party, who had arrived not long before us.

Next morning’s planned take-off was a repeat performance of the Nancy episode–except this time three of the Dewoitines refused to start. Try as we might, we couldn’t get all three running in unison. One engine would finally be coaxed into life, only to expire as soon as we turned our backs on it to attend to the other two. This happened time and again. It was a full hour and a half before we were eventually able to get off the ground. It was a Sunday, the previous night’s storm had abated and the weather was perfect. It had all the makings of a very pleasant flight. But, in fact, all it did was to persuade the three clowns I had with me today to indulge in even more idiotic antics.

The route we had been given didn’t help much either. Soon after crossing into Hungarian airspace we found ourselves flying over the sun-dappled surface of Lake Balaton. It seemed as if every weekend sailor from Budapest and beyond was taking advantage of the glorious weather. The lake was dotted with yachts of every shape and size. It was all too much for my over-excitable companions. One after the other they peeled away from me in elegant diving turns. Moments later they were low over the glittering waters of the lake weaving in and out between the yachts.

It made a pretty picture from my vantage point on high. But it also made my hair stand on end, for I soon realized that they were not simply flying around between the yachts–they were actually using them as targets to carry out practice low-level attacks! The terrified boat owners stood absolutely no chance of getting out of the way, of course, and I was fervently praying that the inevitable wouldn’t happen…when the inevitable happened. One of the yachts was capsized by the slipstream from a D.520 roaring past too close alongside it.

This evidently shocked some sense into my three musketeers. They climbed back up to me and sheepishly resumed what might loosely be termed formation, at least until we had the low range of hills around Fünfkirchen (Pécs) safely behind us. Not long afterwards we crossed the Danube at Mohács and from there the northern Yugoslav plain stretched ahead of us all the way down to Belgrade. Having recovered their high spirits, my companions now amused themselves by beating up the small villages and isolated farmsteads that lay along our route.

We landed at Belgrade/Semlin around noon and the first thing I did was to offer up a prayer of thanks that nothing more serious had occurred and that no complaint regarding the incident on Lake Balaton had come in. Then I gave vent to my feelings in a torrent of words and gestures; the latter no doubt being the more intelligible to the three bemused Bulgarians. I also had to make my report to Hauptmann Hollweg, who conveyed the gist of my remarks to the trio in their own language. At least they had the grace to look contrite.

The final leg to Karlovo–with me again bringing up the rear having first had to cajole two more recalcitrant Hispano-Suiza engines into reluctant life–was a model of mid-European discipline. This was perhaps not all that surprising, given that our route took us along the Morava River to Nis and thence through the Pirot Pass, which was Yugoslav partisan-held territory for most of the way.

When we arrived at Karlovo the Dewoitines of the main group were already drawn up in a long immaculate line as if on parade. This did not deter my two wingmen from expressing their joy at a safe return home by making a low-level pass across the field, waggling their wings and almost flattening the grass in their wake.

Then it was time to make ourselves presentable and report to the CO of the field’s resident Bulgarian fighter wing. This worthy welcomed Hollweg and me in true Slav fashion with a passionate embrace and kisses on both cheeks. We were conducted to our quarters in the nearby resort town, where a party in our honour had been arranged for the evening. This turned into just about the most riotous gathering I have ever attended in my entire life. We had naturally assumed that proceedings would kick off in the accepted fashion with a hearty meal. But we were sadly mistaken.

The revellers got down to hard drinking straight away, with only the odd morsel of food passing our lips between sessions devoted to emptying every bottle that was placed in front of us. The whole crowd soon became extremely loud and extremely cheerful. But these lads could certainly hold their alcohol. It must have been very close to midnight before the party reached its frenetic climax. And it wasn’t just the champagne corks that were popping; pistols and all kinds of other weapons were being emptied into the ceiling and a fine rain of plaster was drizzling down, coating us all in a thin layer of white dust. In the midst of all this tumult and mayhem, loud toasts and bucolic vows of eternal friendship filled the large room. It was a scene of complete chaos.

Next morning–nearer midday, to be more precise–pale, zombie-like figures could be seen shambling about, each in their own alcoholic daze. One of these apparitions had been detailed to fly me to Sofia, where Hauptmann Hollweg and I had been invited to visit Commander Alexandrov and his sister, who was a stage actress currently appearing at the capital’s main theatre. I wasn’t in the most sober of conditions myself, but when I walked out to the Bücker Bü 131 and saw the state of my new bosom friend, Stefan Marinopolski, who was unsteadily holding on to the machine’s wing for dear life, I had a quick change of heart.

“If I’m for the chop,” I decided, “I’ll be the one wielding the axe.” I motioned that I would pilot the aircraft. Stefan peered at me through swollen, half-closed eyes and seemed about to argue the point. But then he gave in and accepted the situation. So the pair of us strapped ourselves in and managed to reach the Bulgarian capital without mishap. There Hollweg and I spent a very pleasant and civilized evening in the charming company of the Alexandrovs. The following morning we boarded a Junkers Ju 52 transport for the return flight, via Vienna, to Nancy.

During the remaining weeks of that September 1943 I was kept fully occupied teaching a new group of trainees the skills needed for combat flying. It was a rewarding task, but my proficiency at it was a double-edged sword. For their part, personnel and postings were no doubt congratulating themselves on having fitted a round peg neatly into a round hole. From my point of view, however, I was all too conscious of the fact that I had not yet fired a shot in anger and was still as far away from an operational unit as ever.

But with the job in hand requiring my complete and undivided attention, there was little time to dwell on such matters. While fully aware that the tide of war was turning, my fellow instructors and I lived each day as it came. The news that trickled through to us of the terrible sufferings being endured both by the civilian populations of Germany’s bombed cities and by our comrades on the fighting fronts affected us deeply. But, we reasoned, it could only be a matter of time before our turn came.

What didn’t enter our heads was that we could lose the war. We were so thoroughly steeped in the official line of thinking that such a possibility simply didn’t occur to us–although our indoctrination did not preclude the occasional wry smile at some of the wilder flights of propaganda fancy emanating from our lords and masters. For us one thing was certain: the war had to be won. Defeat and everything that would come after it was out of the question.

Before leaving the subject of my time at Nancy, however, there is one episode which, although it has little to do with my flying activities, perhaps deserves mention. It is etched for all time in my memory as ‘Annelies’s Birthday’. Among the staff in our admin offices were a number of so-called ‘Stabshelferinnen’. These were civilian German female auxiliaries who, as a kind of national service, had been drafted in to work as typists, secretaries and the like for the armed forces. As a rule they were young unmarried girls.

Those employed at Nancy did not live on the base, but were billeted in a large requisitioned school outside of town on the edge of the plateau about one kilometre away. The school and its extensive grounds were strictly off limits to all male personnel, of course. I had been seeing quite a lot of one of the girls–the aforementioned Annelies–and, knowing that her birthday was coming up, I had booked us a table at one of Nancy’s top restaurants for dinner that evening. I had also arranged my training schedule so that we could spend the afternoon together as well. It was a fine summer Sunday and I suggested several places that we could visit or things that we could do, but Annelies didn’t appear all that keen on any of my ideas. She clearly had something else in mind, but seemed unwilling, or unable, to tell me what it was.

“Come on, Annelies,” I prompted, “if you’ve got some other suggestion, spit it out.” “Look, I tell you what,” she said with a slight shrug, “why don’t I bake us a nice cake, make a pot of coffee, and then we can have a picnic in the field behind the school. There’ll be hardly anyone else around. A lot of the girls are away on holiday and the others will be working, so nobody will see us.” I was dumbstruck at first, and said we couldn’t possibly risk it. But, to be honest, the more I thought about it, the more appealing it became. After all, if Adam could give in to temptation, who was I to hold out. And so, immediately after lunch in the officers’ mess, I jumped on my bike and pedalled up to the plateau. (That was my first punishable offence of the day, for it was strictly against standing orders to take a service bicycle off the station. And with a yellow ‘5’ painted on its frame–yellow for 3. Staffel–my two-wheeled steed was all too clearly an item of service equipment.)

As it was a Sunday and all the shops were shut, I had been unable to buy any flowers. But I had everything else we needed for the picnic. For her part, Annelies had the coffee and cake all ready and waiting. We carried the things out into the large secluded meadow, surrounded by trees, that stretched away to the rear of the school. Choosing a nice cosy corner, we trampled a circle some three metres wide in the lush waist-high grass, spread the cloth, laid out the crockery and began the birthday party. I was able to devote my full attention to Annelies, for we could not be overlooked and the spot we had selected was perfectly hidden…or so we thought.

After we had finished our picnic, matters started to take their natural course–as matters do–and the realities of the outside world faded into oblivion. In my subconscious I was dimly aware of the sounds of various aircraft taking off and landing on the airfield below. I registered the deep-throated roar of a Me 109’s engine being run up, and then the tinnier note of our Fieseler Storch taking off. With its remarkably low speed of just fifty-five kilometres an hour, the Storch was the favourite mount of our Gruppenkommandeur, who would regularly use it to go boar hunting.

We normally welcomed these expeditions of his, for he rarely returned empty-handed and our cook could always be counted upon to conjure up the most succulent game roasts for the mess table. But on this occasion the noise of the Storch taking to the air should have set the alarm bells jangling in my head. By this time, however, Annelies and I had got to the stage where four of my five senses were no longer functioning properly. Then suddenly–but far too late–I heard a distinctive rustling sound in the air. It was rapidly getting louder and coming closer. We glanced up and to our horror saw the Fieseler Storch, its engine switched off, glide into view just above the tops of the trees.

Scrambling quickly apart, Annelies and I both stared upwards…straight into the eyes of the Gruppenkommandeur, who was looking down at us through the side window of the steeply banking Storch. With a tiny squeal Annelies, wearing nothing but a signet ring, immediately threw herself onto her stomach–a natural enough reaction under the circumstances, I suppose, but one which did little to retrieve the situation.

As for myself, programmed as I was by years of military training, my first instinct in the presence of a superior officer was to salute! But how? I was also lying in the grass without a stitch on. Had I been wearing my cap, I might have got away with a normal military salute–fingers touching the peak: ‘like this’, as we used to call it. Without headgear one was supposed to salute ‘like that’, which meant performing the ‘Heil Hitler’ greeting but without actually saying the words. However, as one part of my anatomy was still giving a very fair imitation of the ‘Heil Hitler’, I felt that raising my right arm as well might perhaps be overdoing things.

While these ridiculous thoughts were racing through my head, the Storch had disappeared–and so too had our party mood. Furious that her birthday had been ruined, Annelies had got to her knees. Every curve quivering with rage, she hurled some very un-ladylike epithets after the departed Storch. “You just wait and see,” she turned to me still boiling with anger, “I bet he shops you to the Kommodore.” “Nonsense,” I replied, “he’s got enough rank to haul me over the coals himself. He doesn’t need any extra help.” Dejectedly we began to gather our things together. The birthday party was well and truly over.

During dinner in the mess that evening–the restaurant booking had been cancelled by mutual consent–the Geschwader-adjutant unexpectedly appeared at my table with an evil grin on his face: “Right then, Fischer, report to the Kommodore’s office tomorrow at 13.30 hours. I’m sure you already know why.” So Annalies had been right after all. That cowardly swine must really have wanted my hide nailed to the wall if he was prepared to take the matter to the Kommodore. But there was nothing I could do about it, no excuses I could make; the ‘bare facts’ spoke for themselves.

My only recourse was to make myself as smart and presentable as possible, report to the Kommodore as ordered, and take whatever ‘Old Frau Mayer’ had in store for me. (Just how the Geschwaderkommodore had acquired this nickname nobody knew. He was admittedly somewhat older–around the forty mark, I would guess–but he was wiry, an accomplished flyer, and by no stretch of the imagination an ‘old woman’.)