Presentation Date: February 26, 1998
Jack Hildebrandt
A Luftwaffe bomber and fighter pilot, talks about enlisting & training in the German Air Force, and several missions. Jack lost a total of six aircraft, making him an 'American Ace'. In this unique profile, we get a different perspective of the war and understand first-hand the effects of the allied bombing on Germany. A Luftwaffe bomber and fighter pilot, talks about enlisting & training in the German Air Force, and several missions. Jack lost a total of six aircraft, making him an 'American Ace'. In this unique profile, we get a different perspective of the war and understand first-hand the effects of the allied bombing on Germany.
"Risks & Survival - a Luftwaffe Pilot's Story"
A firestorm in Wurzburg, caused by an RAF bombing, came as close as any incident to claiming the life of Jack Hildebrandt. Hildebrandt was recovering from wounds from one of his 71 missions flying Ju-88 bombers when he had to hustle into a basement bomb-shelter. As the inferno raged through the city above, the shelter door glowed red with heat. Jack and a companion were the last living men to emerge from the shelter.
A standing-room-only crowd at our February meeting heard the Golden Gate Wing's own former Luftwaffe pilot describe some of the stories of life and death that are Jack's personal experiences.
Jack's turn to the military came as he was graduating from an elite college. Fulfilling a childhood wish to fly, Jack signed up with a Luftwaffe recruitment officer who visited the school. He says, "I thought I'd rather die in the air in style, than in the mud with a bayonet in my gut." Hildebrandt says of the 63 students he studied with, 11 graduated and only three (including Jack) survived World War Two.
In December, 1941, Jack was called up for basic training, an exceptionally brutal experience for him, as his drill instructor didn't think Jack fit the image of a strapping six-foot Aryan. Surviving, Jack moved on to primary flight school in Poland. His only snag came when the flight surgeon pronounced him "a half-inch too short", and unfit to fly. Through his mother's Prussian connections, Jack got a waiver allowing him to proceed with pilot training. Now he had twin hurdles - - his height and his mother's social influence!
But Jack passed his training with flying colors. After multi-engine training in central Germany and operational combat school 50 miles south of the Baltic Sea, Jack joined Kamphgeschwader 1, based at Riga in Latvia, in November, 1942. There, he would begin flying combat missions in Ju-88 bombers.
On Hildebrandt's very first mission, he was shown the harsh reality of death. A flak burst, above and to the right of the Ju-88 bomber Jack was piloting, ripped through the bomber's cockpit. The navigator was virtually decapitated, and his frozen blood covered the right side of the canopy. Freezing air streamed through the hole in the canopy as Jack and his remaining crew completed the mission.
In the spring, after Stalingrad, Hildebrandt was reassigned to fly in the Luftwaffe Bomber Command on the Don River. On one mission he was shot down by a Yak 9, and Jack made sure his crew stayed together as they baled out. Fifty miles behind Russian lines, the four aviators began slogging through the mud back to German lines. Part of their trip was shortened by walking on a road, right behind a Russian column that fortunately never looked back to spot them.
Shot down again in August, 1943, Jack was hit in his left leg by a bullet. Fortunately the bone wasn't shattered, but getting to a hospital was an ordeal, as the field ambulance Jack was riding in was strafed, killing all aboard but Jack. His rehab at a hospital in Stalino was cut short when the Soviets counterattacked. Jack was rushed onto a cattle train - - and the car behind his was blown up by a Russian tank as the train pulled out of the station.
After a brief rehabilitation, Jack was returned to combat duty and flew missions in Poland. In July, 1944 multi-engined bomber crews were transitioned to fly Fw-190/F8 fighter-bombers. After a 30 minute check ride, Jack began the first of 15 ground attack missions in the Netherlands. In November, 1944 returning from a mission at about 700 feet altitude, Jack's Focke-Wulf was hit by heavy ground fire. "I had a big piece, I don't know if it was airplane or what, in my left calf. I had pieces in my left gut, and they had gotten my through the elbow. I could see daylight through my elbow. "
Crash-landing, Hildebrandt was taken to an aid station. He had gangrene, and was diagnosed by a surgeon as being lucky if he'd survive the day. Yet he did survive, had surgery, and during this rehab he experienced the near-fatal firestorm in Wurzburg.
On April 2nd, 1945 Jack became a prisoner -of-war and took the risk of being sent to a camp in Marseilles, France - - notorious for overcrowded conditions, red dust stirred by winds off North Africa, and lack of sufficient food. He took yet another risk - - walking into the camp commander's office and requesting to be sent to Wiesbaden. The reply came three days later, and Jack not only returned home, but later came to the United States and served a distinguished career with the Defense Department.
Jack is writing his personal account of survival in a book he hopes to publish soon.