332nd Flying Mongrels were flying Tempests and Spit 16’s. We were tasked to defend V61 out of A3. Problem was those AC really burn the fuel. The Spits landed and refueled. I will not mention the spit pilots that broke their gear landing. Needless to say they are all peeling potatoes for a month and helping their chief mechanic repair the broken undercarriage.
Took us about 30 minutes to reach our base to defend and we had not been on station more than 5 min when some 190F8’s showed up east and dove in. We engaged and managed to down them all. I don’t think we lost any in that engagement which lasted about 5 minutes. They damaged V61, but it did not destroy it. We then took turns refueling again at a near by base and then were ordered to attack V30 I think. Straff as much of it down as possible. On the way there we engaged some TA-152’s. The TA-152 IMHO is a nice match for the Tempest. I had a real hard time catching them above 20k. The Tempest tends to shine at about 7k to about 20k. I chased one for quite a while, but could not close. He kept peeking back which allowed me to finally gain on him. The closer I got the more he rolled and was looking back. Finally I had him. Skernsk was there all the time tell me I was clear or not. When he had to break due to an enemy I always broke off mine to make sure he was OK. After the 152 chase I went after a damaged 109G14. Had a hard time closing on him too, and that is when Skernsk said I had one on me. The G14 I was on began to get desperate with the evasives. Skernsk warned me about the one behind me again and looking back sure enough there he was, but I could tell with the evasives of the G14 Skernsk would gain on the one that was on me. I told myself “we will see what kind of wingman Skernsk is.
I concentrated on the G14 and sure enough Skernsk came across the radio and said he bagged him. Moments later I finished off the G14.
We returned to base and called it a night.
We had 16 pilots, one death and 20 kills. A good night for us. Sour and TCE who winged up shot down 9 between them.
