Christopher A. Lawrence is a professional historian and military analyst. He is the Executive Director and President of The Dupuy Institute, an organization dedicated to scholarly research and objective analysis of historical data related to armed conflict and the resolution of armed conflict. The Dupuy Institute provides independent, historically-based analyses of lessons learned from modern military experience.
Mr. Lawrence was the program manager for the Ardennes Campaign Simulation Data Base, the Kursk Data Base, the Modern Insurgency Spread Sheets and for a number of other smaller combat data bases. He has participated in casualty estimation studies (including estimates for Bosnia and Iraq) and studies of air campaign modeling, enemy prisoner of war capture rates, medium weight armor, urban warfare, situational awareness, counterinsurgency and other subjects for the U.S. Army, the Defense Department, the Joint Staff and the U.S. Air Force. He has also directed a number of studies related to the military impact of banning antipersonnel mines for the Joint Staff, Los Alamos National Laboratories and the Vietnam Veterans of American Foundation.
His published works include papers and monographs for the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment and the Vietnam Veterans of American Foundation, in addition to over 40 articles written for limited-distribution newsletters and over 60 analytical reports prepared for the Defense Department. He is the author of Kursk: The Battle of Prokhorovka (Aberdeen Books, Sheridan, CO., 2015), America’s Modern Wars: Understanding Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam (Casemate Publishers, Philadelphia & Oxford, 2015), War by Numbers: Understanding Conventional Combat (Potomac Books, Lincoln, NE., 2017) and The Battle of Prokhorovka (Stackpole Books, Guilford, CT., 2019)
Mr. Lawrence lives in northern Virginia, near Washington, D.C., with his wife and son.
The German Air Force versus Russia, 1942 by Generalleutnant Hermann Plocher mentions Richthofen being elevated to Commander-in-Chief of Fourth Air Fleet on 24 June 1942; so, maybe the date of interest to you is also in that book; although that author’s focus is on the year prior to the one of interest to you. He also states that Richthofen “assumed” command in July 1942.
As for Dessloch, the author writes that he later took command of Fourth and Sixth Air Fleets after having commanded I Flack Corp during invasion of Russia. So, not too likely that he provides the precise date of interest to you.
Meanwhile, Gen. Wikipedia states “Generaloberst Otto Deßloch, 4 September 1943 – 17 August 1944” in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luftflotte_4#Commanding_officers (using Luftflotte 4 @ Lexikon der Wehrmacht and Luftflotte 4 @ The Luftwaffe, 1933-45 as references).
https://asisbiz.com/luftwaffe/lfl4.html also gives that date.
https://www.ww2.dk/air/hq/lfl4.htm also states Sept. 4 as the start date.
https://www.axishistory.com/books/196-germany-luftwaffe/luftwaffe-air-units-higher-units/5467-luftflotte-4 also gives Sept. 4 based upon research by Gareth Collins using the following reference material: Krzysztof Janowicz – Luftflotte IV 1939. Why “1939” is in that title is beyond me.
Hope that there is a lead in there for you, somewhere!
Yea, I think I need to see some real documentation. There is a limit to secondary sources. He took command in early June 1943, but I would like to get the exact date. Wikipedia is showing that Richthofen took over the Second Air Fleet on 12 June 1943, which would argue for the 11 June date.
Dessloch was given temporary command of the Fourth Air Fleet, as the Luftwaffe Chief of Staff Jeschonnek was supposed to take it over in August. Apparently fighting on the Eastern Front was a more appealing job than working for Hermann Goering. But, this transfer did not happen, so Dessloch continued as commander and Jeschonnek went and committed suicide.
Got the following response from Dr. Andrew Arthy of Australia (see airwarpublications.com)
I checked the file held by the IWM Duxford about von Richthofen (which is based on captured German records), and it notes that he took over Luftflotte 2 on 1 June 1943, but I think this might be a typo. The equivalent file for Dessloch does not give a date for his assumption of command of Luftflotte 4.
In von Richthofen’s PERS file at the BA-MA there is no information about his Luftwaffe service in 1943.
From an ULTRA signal, on 11 June 1943 the VIII. Fliegerkorps Ia signalled General Seidemann via Braunschweig-Waggum, summoning him on order of GFM von Richthofen to be in Dnjepropetrowsk-Süd as early as possible on 12 June 1943 to report to Landsknecht (Luftflotte 4). After reporting there he was to fly on to VIII. Fliegerkorps.
In von Richthofen’s diary, there are no entries between 6 and 10 June 1943. On 11 June 1943 he was on an early morning flight to Ainring in General Korten’s aircraft. He met with Göring and was told about his new role with Luftflotte 2. On 12 June 1943 he flew to Rome.
So based on those snippets, I would suggest 11 June 1943 was when he handed over command of Luftflotte 4.