‘Knockout 17’ – The Victor
The RAF pilot credited with shooting down Hauptmann Albert Hufenreiter and his crew was Pilot O ff icerRJEBoul ding, flying Spitfire P8380, ZP-Q, of 74 Squadron. Such was the paucity of RAF night fighter aircraft availability at this time, that RAF day fighter squadrons were regularly engaged on what were known as ‘Fighter Night’ patrols, but with day pilots operating in unfamiliar night conditions, and in aircraft designed solely for day fighting, successes were rare and casualties through accidents were frequent.
Pilot Officer Boulding’s claim on the night of 10/11 May 1941 was a rare achievement. He set out the details in his combat report:
“I was ‘Knockout 17’ on layer patrol over London at 18,000 feet. While on patrol my airscrew pitch control went unserviceable, and I started to return to West Malling. I had come down to approximately 17,000 feet on a SE course when I saw a twin engined machine at the same height, about 200 yards to my starboard, and steering approximately the same direction.
“I flew underneath and behind it and identified it as a hostile aircraft. I then fired a very steady burst from between 50 to 100 yards from astern and below at an angle of about 20⁰. Up to this time, the enemy aircraft had apparently not seen me. I saw De Wilde ammunition striking the fuselage and a mass of what looked like very large sparks came back at me as my burst reached the aircraft. Some metal part of the enemy aircraft damaged my air intake and grazed my airscrew.
“The enemy aircraft immediately slowed up and dived steeply without altering course. I had great difficulty in keeping behind the enemy aircraft. On the dive, I fired two short bursts of about one to two seconds from port and starboard. I experienced some difficulty with icing-up on the inside of the bulletproof windscreen.
“The enemy aircraft flew as low as possible, and I found it extremely difficult to keep the enemy aircraft in sight as I was forced to fly slightly higher than the enemy aircraft and he was thus against a dark background of the land, and I was silhouetted against the lighter sky.
“I weaved from side to side in an endeavour to keep track of him and noticed that when I was on the starboard side (where I was up-moon of the enemy aircraft) the top rear gunner could apparently see me as he fired some accurate bursts on that side but none when I was on the portside.
“Whilst the enemy aircraft was very much low flying, I got in two more short bursts at between 100 and 200 yards from port and starboard and slightly above and behind.
“I last saw the enemy aircraft going approximately SE at about midnight. From my vector home to West Malling, this would be about 10 miles SE of Maidstone. I landed at West Malling at 00.10 hours.
“It is confirmed that at approximately 00.05 hours a Heinkel 111 crashed at Kennington near Ashford.”
Little over one month later, on 17 June 1941, Pilot Officer Boulding was shot down over France and taken POW.