Emil “Bully” Lang: 18 Aerial Kills in One Day!

Focke-Wulf Fw 190 A-5/U8 model (JG 26), similar to Emil Lang’s final aircraft. Image credit: hamfisted-modeller.blogspot.com. On September 3, 1944, he took off on a transfer flight from Melsbroek, Belgium, just northeast of Brussels, at 1:20 PM, immediately experiencing difficulty raising his landing gear, which remained fully extended for the next 10 minutes. At an altitude of only 660 feet, one of his two wingmen urgently reported enemy fighters to the rear. Lang and the other wingman, Lieutenant Alfred Gross, an ace with 52 confirmed kills, broke upward and to the left, while his second wingman dived away with two fighters on his tail, and force-landed at a nearby airfield. Gross claimed to have shot down an attacking British Spitfire before being shot down himself and parachuting to the ground. Emil Lang’s Fw 190 A-5 was seen by German forces in a vertical dive at Overhespen, Belgium, with the landing gear still extended. American First Lieutenant Darrel S. Cramer (later a brigadier general), a P-51D Mustang pilot with the 338th Fighter Squadron, led a formation of three Mustangs over Brussels, intercepting a group of three to six Fw 190s. Cramer made a high-angle, deflection shot, struck one of the German fighters, and positively saw it hit the ground and explode. This was most probably Lieutenant Karl-Heinz Kempf, an ace with 65 kills to his credit, and winner of the Knight’s Cross medal, shot down near Baal, Belgium, 14 miles northeast of Brussels, in an Fw 190 A-8, numbered “Black 9.” Lieutenant Karl-Heinz Kempf. Photo: falkeeins.blogspot.com. Meanwhile, farther east, four British Spitfire Mk. XIIs of No. 41 Squadron fought with Fw 190s over Tirlemont (Tienen, in Flemish), Belgium, during which time Warrant Officer Peter W. Chattin was shot down and killed, possibly by Alfred Gross, and Pilot Officer Patrick T. Coleman claimed an Fw-190, probably Gross’s aircraft. Flight Lieutenant Terence “Terry” Spencer, age 26, after taking hits to the tail of his Spitfire, shot down another Fw 190, which dove vertically into the ground and exploded. This combat action resulted in confusion and controversy, with Cramer and Spencer each claiming to have shot down the great German ace, Emil “Bully” Lang. However, the crash site at Overhespen was too far east for the American Mustangs, and the details of the dogfight perfectly matched the British Spitfire version of the story, with Alfred Gross even specifically stating that he shot down a Spitfire, not a Mustang, just as Emil Lang’s last three victories in the same area were all British Spitfires. Flight Lieutenant Terry Spencer’s Spitfire Mk. XII, and Flight Lieutenant Terry Spencer. Photo credits: Royal Air Force.   Logically, Lang had to have been shot down by Terry Spencer, a pilot who had previously shot down seven German V-1 flying bombs over Sussex and Kent from June through late-August 1944, plus one more in his logbook, which was never officially credited to him. His 1,735-horsepower Spitfire Mk. XII was one of the fastest fighters in the world at that time, with clipped wingtips for superb, low-altitude maneuverability, armed with two Hispano Mk. II 20x110mm cannon and four Browning .303-caliber machine guns. Just days later, his squadron converted to a more-powerful (2,050 HP) Spitfire Mk. XIVs, with a new, five-blade propeller, and the .303 guns replaced by two Browning M2 heavy machine guns in .50 caliber. One British pilot aptly described the Mk. XIV as “a hairy beast to fly,” a sleek, brutally-powerful fighter. Interestingly enough, Terry Spencer also holds an official world record: On April 19, 1945, while flying a Spitfire Mk. XIV, he was shot down over Wismar Bay, in northern Germany, while strafing a German trawler in the harbor with rockets. He successfully bailed out of his stricken Spitfire at the impossibly low altitude of just 30-40 feet, and was injured, captured, and hospitalized, but he survived the jump, the lowest, authenticated, bail-out survival in history, according to the Guinness Book of Records! Terry Spencer’s Spitfire Mk. XIV, January 1945. Photo credit: bravobravoaviation.com. The official record book reads: “Lowest Parachute Escape: Sqn. Ldr. Terence Spencer, RAF, achieved the lowest-ever aircraft escape at a height of 9-12m (30-40 ft.), Wismar Bay, Germany, on April 19, 1945.” As dramatic as it seems, such a jump is technically possible. British parachutes, such as the Spitfire’s Irvin seat harness, open canopy-first, faster than American parachutes, and the speed of the aircraft makes a difference, as well. I once jumped from an MC-130E Combat Talon aircraft at 140 knots, faster than the usual, 125 knots jump speed. My chute was fully deployed in just over two seconds, and the opening shock was noticeably greater than normal. Assuming that Spencer jumped from about 35 feet altitude, at an estimated 150 knots airspeed (still safe, but just barely), the force of gravity would drop him 48 feet in the first two seconds, not vertically, but at a forward, oblique angle, and his chute would open in just under two seconds. So, he would likely have just hit the water as his parachute canopy fully deployed above Wismar Bay, abruptly halting his descent speed. It’s survivable over water, not land, but he’d be injured, soaking wet, and be quickly captured by the Germans. That’s probably how it happened. Spencer was liberated by the Allies two weeks later and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) for his daring exploits, as well as the Belgian Croix de Guerre (“War Cross”) with Palm. In 2002, he and his wife co-authored a book entitled “Living Dangerously,” and he lived on to the age of 90.   So, Emil Lang’s notable, record-breaking accomplishment of 18 aerial kills in a single day wasn’t the only remarkable aspect of this war story. Mark Twain once observed that “Truth is stranger than fiction,” and this amazing-but-true tale certainly highlights the bizarre twists and turns of fate in wartime.