Leistungsbuch (performance book / additional log to Flugbuch)

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'Clock High!:

Dick Powers
Rall’s Liestungsbuch
Mon Jul 22 23:19:26 2002
63.150.97.2

I’m reading Geunther Rall’s recently published memoirs. In the book are several photocopies of his “Liestungsbuch”, according to the author.

Apparently this book documents only victories and in different from the “Flugbuch” that I am familiar with. The reproduced pages show his victories 1-19, 20-38, 39-52, 199-212, 241-254, 269-273. The data shown for each victory (presumably, confirmed) are
Victory Number
Aircraft Type
Date
Time
Location
Height
Witness
“Bemergungen(?)” (Translation, please? )

This Liestungsbuch is new to me. Any ideas here how common they were? It looks like a pre-printed form and the entries are typed, not handwritten. It’s certainly not a log book. I think this is the first time I have heard of this document.

It’s a shame that the other pages aren’t reproduced, as it would have given a complete record of 273 victories.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Mark Huxtable
Bemerkungen
Mon Jul 22 23:43:04 2002
63.12.29.39

As far as I know, "Bemerkungen" is approximately equivalent to "Notes" or "Remarks".

Cheers,

Mark Huxtable

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Radiomonitor
Leistungsbuch
Tue Jul 23 07:45:11 2002
80.33.178.189

02.07.23-0634z--Leistungsbuch:

Leistungsbuch=performance book

Bemerkungen=comments/incidents

The Leistungsbuch was not in the possession of the soldier. It was part of the unit administration's records covering each member of the unit - pilots and other crew - ground personnel - and also unit administration people. - When a soldier was transferred from one unit to another, the Leistungsbuch followed him so that the commander of the new unit could get full information of the soldier coming to his unit. The information of the Leistungsbuch was not even available to the soldier himself. It was also the main basis for promotions in rank(=Dienstgrad) and activity(=Dienststelle), as well as basis for honors(=Auszeichnungen)--KAL+

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Andreas Brekken
Leistungsbuch - what happened to them?
Tue Jul 23 08:24:07 2002
129.240.8.184

Hi,

interesting topic.

Would the Leistungsbuch (or a copy) of a MIA/POW/KIA with officer rank be kept with other parts of the personnel record (thus now at BA Aachen)?

What about lesser ranks?

All information of interest, especially input from people who has accessed records at Aachen.

Regards

Andreas

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Radiomonitor
Leistungsbuch
Tue Jul 23 09:30:36 2002
80.33.178.189

02.07.23-0823z--It is difficult to say where all these documents landed. I am aware, that on the 4th May evening many commanders had the files destroyed in order to protect their soldiers. Other documents were destroyed by enemy actions - British and American bombing. Russian artillery. - A more or less complete SS-archive was established during the war by the Germans in Tjekoslovakia, and has survived the war. It is after the war used by the Tjekoslovakian government for propaganda campaigns against persons or units. - If you contact German authorities they might give you information, where to locate still existing documents--KAL+

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Rabe Anton
Leistungsbücher
Tue Jul 23 11:22:04 2002
205.188.208.136

Possibly deposited at Cornelie-Münster?

RA

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dick Powers
Thanks Very Much
Tue Jul 23 15:39:20 2002
63.150.97.2

This explains why Rall's Leistungsbuch was signed by the Gruppe adjudant.

As I said, it's a shame that the book did not reproduce all the pages.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dick Powers
Also...
Tue Jul 23 15:42:09 2002
63.150.97.2

It's a shame the author of Rall's memoirs refers to the Liestungsbuch as his log book

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dick Powers
Another Question
Tue Jul 23 18:03:01 2002
63.150.97.2

Now that I know the Leistungsbuch was an official record of a soldier's performance, can we assume that the victories recorded there were only confirmed victories?

Apparently Rall's Liestunbbuch stopped with 273 - perhaps because 274 and 275 weren't confirmed?

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Nick Beale
Leistungsbücher
Tue Jul 23 18:47:31 2002
212.159.21.15

Not everyone in the Luftwaffe was a fighter pilot and the few LB I have looked at belonged to an enlisted or NCO pilots of NSG 9 (the other crew who still had Flugbücher did not have their LB). The information in this case was essentially the same as in the FB but with more detail about bombloads and (if I remember) a point score for each mission carried out - I guess for calculating eligibility for awards.

Re fighters, this whole "confirmed victory" business is a bit of a blind alley for historians. Now there is the opportunity for much more checking between the records of claimants and their opponents than during the war. Many "confirmed victories" just didn't happen, the other guy got home safe. The idea of confrmed victories just points to what was believed at the time, not the "truth" of a pilot's achievements.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Marcel van Heijkop
Leistungsbücher for Bomber crews
Tue Jul 23 20:32:32 2002
62.131.114.33

Hi all,

I have never heard before about a Leistungsbuch as being a log about the performance of the airman in question, but as Nick already mentioned there's another form of Leistungsbuch to which I can add something:

It was used by crew members of some Kampfgeschwader/bomber units as a kind of additional log to the ordinary Flugbuch. In the Leistungsbuch all (and only) the Feindflüge (combat missions)are worked out in great detail, it contains the following entries:

- Nr. des Feindflüges (yep, sortie number)
- Wertung als Frontflug ("score" regarding the severity of the mission, as Nick pointed out this has something to do with calculating awards)
- Baumuster (A/C type, unfortunately for us historians there is no entry for the A/C code)
- Tag (day)
- von/bis (take off time and time of landing)
- Zeit über Feind-, b.z.w. feindgefährdetem Gebiet (time spent over enemy territory)
- Flugweg (route from and to the target, sometimes waypoints included)
- Eindringtiefe ( kilometres flown behind the front line)
- Feindberührung, Jagd und Flak (comments about the enemy defences, fighters and AAA included. Entries will show something like: "accurate Flak of heavy calibre or enemy nightfigher over target area")
- Ergebnis des Fluges, z.B. Abschüsse, Artillerie-Einschiessen, Aufklärung, Bombenwurf unter Angabe von Angriffshöhe, Wurfart, Zahl der Anflüge, ob Luftbildbestätigung des Erfolgen usw. (Result of the combat mission, F.E. kills,artillery, recce, amount of bombs and type dropped and from which altitude, amount of bomb runs necessary, whether pictures were taken in order to confirm the bombing results, and so on....)
- Bestätigung durch dienststelle und Augenzeugen (confirmation of results by another unit or eyewitnesses)

Apperently some Kampfgeschwader (like I/KG66) had them, others didn't....

If you have one as an historian or enthusiast you can consider yourself very lucky as it is invaluable: the crew's own war diary!

HTH,

Marcel

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Andreas Brekken
Leistungsbücher for Bomber crews
Wed Jul 24 07:31:48 2002
129.240.8.184

Hi, Marcel.

With reference to my earlier posts in this thread, where did You aquire the above mentioned Leistungsbücher?

I don't want You to name any sources, if it is a person and You do not want to do it, but if it originates from a collection or archive, I would be interested.

From what You have written, I would assume that these logs were kept up to date by the Beobachter, then signed by Gruppenkommandeur?

Regards,

Andreas Brekken

Regards,

Andreas Brekken

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Marcel van Heijkop
Collecting Leistungsbücher
Wed Jul 24 22:21:12 2002
62.131.114.33

Hi Andreas,

Regarding collecting Leistungsbücher: No magic I'm afraid! They are hard earned through numerous visits to veterans in Germany :-)

Filling in the logs: My first impression was that only "important" people in the Besatzung (crew), like pilot and Beobachter had one, but I recently discovered that one of I/KG66's Bordschützen (gunner)had one as well..

(I'm still not 100% sure if Leistungsbücher for ordinary gunners was common practice, the fact that this guy also served as a Bordmechaniker (Flight Engineer)could have something to do with it....Anyone?!)

But at least a large part of a bomber crew had one besides the ordinary Flugbuch(which contains all the flights). Great for researchers as you "only" need to find one of the 4 or 5 Leistungsbücher in order to get the adventures of one crew!! ;-)

For some reason BTW not every KG seemed to issue Leistungsbücher: I know of one vet of KG51 who flew hundreds of flights with only a Flugbuch untill he got to I/KG66........Anyone who has similar experiences?

As far as I know the Flug-and Leistungsbücher were discussed and filled in by the entire crew directly after the mission, in order to have the same story for everyone. They were inspected and signed every 10 or 20 flights or so by somebody important: A Staffelkapitän or somebody from the Stab. And they got a big stamp across the pages of course!

"Die Richtigkeit der Flüge unter Flugnr 1 bis 20 bescheinigt." place, date, autograph and F.E. "...(name), Oberleutnant u. Staffelkapitän"

Speaking about collecting logs: We all know that a lot of LW airmen lost their logs to Allied soldiers when they surrendered after the end of the war.

But apart from the obvious "souvenir hunting", can any expert on this board shine his light on whether there was an organized attempt by Allied Intelligence Units to collect them from POW's after the war for evaluation purposes or something?? And if so, where would they be stored today?? PRO and such?

Best regards,

Marcel

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Radiomonitor
Allieds' Souvenier Hunting
Thu Jul 25 07:22:07 2002
80.33.178.189

02.07.25-0619z--The Allieds' main souvenier hunting item from German airmen was our beautiful German wrist watch with chronometer for instrument landings! - They did not care for documents!--KAL+

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dénes Bernád
Allies' Souvenir Hunting
Thu Jul 25 20:44:24 2002
204.101.53.233

If one includes among the Allies the Soviets too (as it should be), then ANY watch/clock would deserve their close 'attention.' Stories of large size desk watches being attached to Soviet soldiers' wrist or neck is not uncommon.

As for the Western Allies, reportedly they were keen to 'liberate' various decorations and badges, too. One story comes to my mind, when H.-U. Rudel landed, the first gesture of the closest GI was to try to rip the unique Ritterkreuz adorned with diamonds off the neck of Rudel. He did not succeed, as Rudel promptly shut close his Stuka's cockpit canopy.

Dénes

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Radiomonitor
Souvenir hunters
Thu Jul 25 20:57:46 2002
80.33.178.189

02.07.25-1954z--From officers to GIs - all were inpressed by our wrist watches - in places where I was forced to frequent - all of us were wrist-watch-free!--KAL+

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Bernd Barbas
Rall´s Leistungsbuch
Wed Jul 24 14:34:25 2002
194.45.48.11

There was a flugbuch showing all flights , mostly the victories were added here too .
In the Leistungsbuch of a fighter pilot all special performance , like victories ,low level attacks , destroyed enemy ground positions , tanks , boats aso were listed too .
I have several Leistungbücher and I am very interested to get a copy of Rall´s Leistungsbuch or Flugbuch , for I have here only a summary from a friend .
Rall had 275 victories .

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dick
Rall
Thu Jul 25 16:49:12 2002
63.150.97.2

I think we all would like to have a copy of Rall's Liestungsbuch. As I mentioned in my inital post, portions of it are reproduced in his recent memoirs.

Incidentally, his Letstungsbuch stops with victory 273 in April, 1944. Perhaps the final two victories were never "officially" confirmed.

[This message has been edited by Richard T Eger (edited 02 September 2002).]