Nickname: Connie
Date of Birth: 19.08.1917 - Konstanz, Grand Duchy of Baden (German Empire)
Date of Death: 02.03.1944 - near Montmédy, Lorraine (France)
Battles and Operations: Battle of France, Battle of Britain, Operation Jubilee (Dieppe Raid), Channel Front defensive operations, Reichsverteidigung against USAAF daylight bomber raids
Religion: No information
Parents: Unknown farmer and unknown mother (grew up on the parents' farm named Hauserhof near Konstanz)
Siblings: No information
Spouse: No information
Children: No information
Promotions:
01.11.1937 entered Luftwaffe as Fahnenjunker
01.08.1939 Leutnant
00.00.1941 Oberleutnant
00.11.1942 Hauptmann
01.06.1943 Major
00.00.1944 Oberstleutnant
Career:
00.00.1917-1937 grew up on family farm Hauserhof near Konstanz, attended Langemarck-Realgymnasium in Singen
01.11.1937 volunteered for Luftwaffe service
1938-1939 flight training at Luftkriegsschule 2 Gatow and Jagdfliegerschule Schleißheim
01.08.1939 Leutnant
06.12.1939 posted to Jagdgeschwader 2 "Richthofen"
13.06.1940 first aerial victory during Battle of France (Morane-Saulnier M.S.406)
1940 Battle of Britain, often as wingman to Helmut Wick, multiple forced landings including swim in English Channel
00.00.1940-1941 short instructor tour at Jagdfliegerschule Werneuchen
10.06.1941 Staffelkapitän 7. Staffel JG 2 "Richthofen"
01.08.1941 Knight's Cross after 21 victories
16.07.1942 German Cross in Gold
November 1942 Gruppenkommandeur III./JG 2 "Richthofen"
23.11.1942 first victories over USAAF four-engine bombers (two B-17, one B-24)
developed head-on attack tactic against bomber boxes with Georg-Peter Eder
16.04.1943 Oak Leaves after 63 victories
01.07.1943 Geschwaderkommodore JG 2 "Richthofen"
05.02.1944 first Channel Front pilot to reach 100 victories
02.03.1944 killed in action leading attack on USAAF bomber formation, shot down by P-47 Thunderbolt escorts
Awards and Decorations:
Verwundetenabzeichen in Silber
Flugzeugführer- und Beobachterabzeichen
Eisernes Kreuz II.Klasse (25.10.1939)
Eisernes Kreuz I.Klasse Class (May 1940)
Frontflugspange für Jäger in Gold mit Anhänger "300"
Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes (01.08.1941, 265th award) as Leutnant and Staffelkapitän of the 7. Staffel of Jagdgeschwader 2 "Richthofen". The award was granted immediately after he achieved his 21st confirmed aerial victory. By this point Mayer had been commanding his Staffel since 10 June 1941 and had already proven himself during the Battle of France and the Battle of Britain, where he flew frequently as wingman to Helmut Wick and survived multiple emergency landings, including one in the English Channel. The 21st victory came during ongoing defensive operations on the Channel Front against the RAF. The award ceremony took place together with two other JG 2 pilots, Erich Leie and Rudolf Pflanz, and was even filmed for the Deutsche Wochenschau newsreel. At the end of 1941 his score had already climbed further to 28 victories, underlining the rapid pace of his success in the West.
Deutsches Kreuz in Gold (16.07.1942) as Oberleutnant, 7./JG 2
Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub #232 (16.04.1943) as Hauptmann and Gruppenkommandeur of III./JG 2 "Richthofen", after reaching his 63rd victory. A decisive contribution to this milestone occurred on 14 February 1943 in a single mission when he shot down three Hawker Typhoons in quick succession (his 60th at 11:36 about 30 km northwest of Calais, 61st at 11:40 roughly 20 km east of Dover, and 62nd at 12:12 about 15 km northwest of Calais). The 63rd victory was scored in the weeks that followed during continued interception missions against RAF fighter-bombers and fighter sweeps over northern France and the Channel. The Oak Leaves recognised both his personal scoring rate and his growing leadership role. On 11 May 1943 Mayer personally received the decoration from Adolf Hitler at the Reich Chancellery in Berlin, after which he was promoted to Major on 1 June 1943.
Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub und Schwertern #51 (02.03.1944, posthumous) as Oberstleutnant and Geschwaderkommodore JG 2 "Richthofen", after reached his 102nd and final victory. The Schwerter were announced on the very day of his death. On 2 March 1944 Mayer personally led his Geschwader in a large-scale interception of a USAAF bomber stream near Montmédy in Lorraine, France. During this engagement he pressed home attacks on the heavily defended bomber boxes, claiming the victories that brought his total to 102 (all scored exclusively in the West, including 26 four-engine bombers, 51 Spitfires and 12 P-47 Thunderbolts). While continuing the assault he was hit by escorting Republic P-47 Thunderbolts and crashed, dying of his wounds at age 26. The award citation highlighted his outstanding leadership in the Reichsverteidigung, his development (together with Georg-Peter Eder) of the effective head-on attack tactic against American bomber formations (first successfully used on 23 November 1942 over St. Nazaire), and the fact that he had become the first pilot on the Channel Front to reach 100 victories only a few weeks earlier on 5 February 1944. The posthumous Schwerter therefore recognised both the cumulative combat success and the final action in which he fell while leading his unit from the front.
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Egon Mayer was born on 19 August 1917 in Konstanz, Grand Duchy of Baden, German Empire, as the son of a farmer whose name has not been recorded in any available historical documentation. He grew up on the family farm known as Hauserhof near Konstanz and attended the Langemarck-Realgymnasium in nearby Singen. His religion is not documented. No information exists about any siblings, and he never married or had children, dying at the age of only twenty-six. Among his comrades he was affectionately known by the nickname Connie.
Mayer volunteered for the Luftwaffe on 1 November 1937 as a Fahnenjunker. He completed his basic military and flight training at Luftkriegsschule 2 in Gatow and at the Jagdfliegerschule in Schleißheim. On 1 August 1939 he was commissioned Leutnant. In 1941 he advanced to Oberleutnant, in November 1942 he became Hauptmann, on 1 June 1943 he was promoted Major, and early in 1944 he reached the rank of Oberstleutnant.
On 6 December 1939 Mayer was posted to Jagdgeschwader 2 Richthofen, the famous unit that would remain his home for the rest of his career. He claimed his very first aerial victory on 13 June 1940 during the Battle of France when he shot down a Morane-Saulnier M.S.406 fighter. Throughout the subsequent Battle of Britain he frequently flew as wingman to the legendary Helmut Wick and survived several emergency landings, one of which forced him to ditch in the English Channel and swim to safety. After a short period as an instructor at Jagdfliegerschule Werneuchen he returned to the front and on 10 June 1941 was appointed Staffelkapitän of the 7. Staffel of JG 2. By 1 August 1941 he had achieved twenty-one confirmed victories, all against Royal Air Force aircraft on the Channel Front, and for this performance he received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross as the 265th recipient of the award. The decoration was presented together with two other JG 2 pilots, Erich Leie and Rudolf Pflanz, and the ceremony was even filmed for the weekly newsreel Deutsche Wochenschau. At the close of 1941 his personal score stood at twenty-eight victories.
On 16 July 1942 Mayer was awarded the German Cross in Gold while still serving as Staffelkapitän. In November 1942 he was appointed Gruppenkommandeur of III. Gruppe of JG 2. Only days later, on 23 November 1942, he scored his first victories against United States Army Air Forces four-engined bombers, claiming two Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses and one Consolidated B-24 Liberator over St. Nazaire. Together with his friend and fellow pilot Georg-Peter Eder he developed and perfected the head-on attack tactic against the massive American bomber boxes; this revolutionary method involved closing at high speed directly toward the nose of the bomber formation, firing a concentrated burst, then breaking away beneath the enemy to avoid the massed defensive fire. The tactic proved so successful that it was soon adopted throughout the Jagdwaffe on the Western Front.
Mayer continued to score rapidly against both RAF fighter-bombers and the growing daylight raids of the USAAF. A particularly outstanding day came on 14 February 1943 when, in a single mission, he shot down three Hawker Typhoons in quick succession: his sixtieth victory northwest of Calais at 11:36, the sixty-first east of Dover at 11:40, and the sixty-second again northwest of Calais at 12:12. These three kills in less than forty minutes brought him to the threshold of the Oak Leaves. Within the following weeks he reached his sixty-third victory and on 16 April 1943, as the 232nd recipient overall, he was awarded the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves while serving as Gruppenkommandeur. On 11 May 1943 Adolf Hitler personally presented the decoration to him at the Reich Chancellery in Berlin. Shortly afterwards, on 1 June 1943, Mayer was promoted to Major, and on 1 July 1943 he was given command of the entire Jagdgeschwader 2 Richthofen as Geschwaderkommodore.
Under his leadership JG 2 became one of the most effective units in the Reichsverteidigung, the defence of Germany against American daylight bombing. On 5 February 1944 Mayer became the first pilot operating exclusively on the Channel Front to reach one hundred aerial victories. His total at that point included twenty-six four-engined bombers, fifty-one Supermarine Spitfires and twelve Republic P-47 Thunderbolts, every one of them scored against Western Allied aircraft. Only weeks later, on 2 March 1944, he personally led his Geschwader in a major interception of a large USAAF bomber stream near Montmédy in Lorraine. In the course of the fierce fighting he pressed home repeated attacks on the heavily defended bomber boxes and claimed the victories that raised his score to 102. While continuing the assault he was attacked by escorting P-47 Thunderbolts, received fatal wounds, and crashed. He died the same day at the age of twenty-six. On that very day the Swords to the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves were awarded to him posthumously as the fifty-first recipient. The citation emphasised not only his personal score but also his outstanding leadership and the tactical innovations he had introduced against the American heavy-bomber offensive.
In more than 353 combat missions Egon Mayer achieved 102 confirmed aerial victories, all of them on the Western Front and without a single kill scored against the Soviet Union. He was one of the very few Luftwaffe fighter leaders who rose from the ranks of the enlisted men and young officers to command an entire Geschwader while still in his mid-twenties. His development of the head-on attack against bomber formations, his coolness under fire during the Battle of Britain, and his willingness to lead from the front until the last moment made him a role model for the young pilots who followed him. Although the war continued for another fourteen months after his death, the loss of Egon Mayer was felt deeply within JG 2 and the wider Jagdwaffe. He is remembered today as one of the most successful and respected fighter pilots of the Channel Front, a farmer's son from Konstanz who became a legend in the skies over France and the Reich.
Source:
Obermaier, E., Die Ritterkreuzträger der Luftwaffe, Hoffmann, 1989
Fellgiebel, W.-P., Elite of the Third Reich - The Recipients of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross 1939-45, Helion & Company Limited, 2003
Kwasny A. und G., Die Eichenlaubträger 1940-1945, Deutsches Wehrkundearchiv, 2001
Patzwall K., Scherzer V., Das Deutsche Kreuz 1941-1945, Geschichte und Inhaber Band II, Verlag Klaus D. Patzwall, 2001
Scherzer, V., Die Ritterkreuzträger 1939-1945, Scherzers Militaer-Verlag, 2007
https://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/
https://en.wikipedia.org/
https://www.tracesofwar.com/
https://ww2gravestone.com/
https://www.findagrave.com/
https://aircrewremembered.com/KrackerDatabase/
https://www.ww2.dk/lwoffz.html
https://forum.axishistory.com/
https://www.wehrmacht-awards.com/forums/
https://www.bundesarchiv.de/en/
https://www.geni.com/
https://books.google.com/
https://rk.balsi.de/index.php?action=list&cat=300
https://www.unithistories.com/units_index/index.php?file=/officers/personsx.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20091027052912fw_/http://geocities.com/orion47.geo/index2.html
