Kurt Welter Kurt Welter ( 25 February 1916 – 7 March 1949 ) was a German " Luftwaffe " fighter ace and the most successful " Jet Expert " of World War II . A flying ace or fighter ace is a military aviator credited with shooting down five or more enemy aircraft during aerial combat . He claimed a total of 63 aerial victories — that is , 63 aerial combat encounters resulting in the destruction of the enemy aircraft — achieved in only 93 combat missions . He recorded 56 victories at night , including 33 Mosquitos , and scored more aerial victories from a jet fighter aircraft than anyone else in World War II and potentially in aviation history . Welter was born in Cologne - Lindenthal ( " Köln - Lindenthal " ) on 25 February 1916 . He joined the military service of the " Luftwaffe " in 1934 and was trained as a pilot . He showed a strong natural ability as a pilot and was subsequently selected for flight instructor training and served many years as a flight instructor . In 1943 Welter transferred to an operational night fighter unit flying contemporary piston engine fighter aircraft . On 18 October 1944 , after 40 combat missions , Welter was awarded the Knight ' s Cross of the Iron Cross ( " Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes " ) . In early 1945 , Welter transferred to an experimental jet night fighter unit flying the Messerschmitt Me 262 . On 11 March 1945 he was awarded the Knight ' s Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves ( " Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub " ) for 48 aerial victories . Welter survived the war and was killed in an accident at a railroad crossing on 7 March 1949 . Biography . Welter was born in Cologne - Lindenthal . He joined the Luftwaffe on 1 October 1934 and was trained as a pilot . Because of his skill as a pilot he was trained as a flight instructor . During World War II , Welter was promoted to " Feldwebel " on 1 August 1940 and transferred to flight training school " Flieger - Ausbildungs - Regiment 63 " and later on to the flight instructor school at Quedlinburg . Here Welter served as a flight instructor until 10 August 1943 when he was transferred to " Blindflugschule 10 " ( school for instrument flight training ) in Altenburg with the rank of " Oberfeldwebel " as a night fighter instructor . On 2 September 1943 , Welter was transferred to 5 . " Staffel " / Jagdgeschwader 301 ( JG 301 ) , a night fighter squadron that experimented with the use of largely radar - less single - seat Fw 190A - 5 and Fw 190A - 6 fighter aircraft by night , often equipped with the FuG 350 " Naxos " device , used in the form of German night - fighter operations without AI radar dubbed " Wilde Sau " ( wild boar ) . On his first " Wilde Sau " intercept mission against Allied bombers on the night of 22 September 1943 , Welter shot down two Allied four - engine bombers . He shot down a further two on his third mission on the night of 3 October 1943 . By the beginning of April , he had accumulated 17 victories in only 15 missions . Subsequently on 10 May 1944 Welter was awarded the German Cross in Gold . " Leutnant " Welter was transferred to 5 . " Staffel " / Jagdgeschwader 300 ( JG 300 ) on 7 July 1944 . In July , Welter claimed two United States Army Air Forces ( USAAF ) B - 17 four - engined bombers and three P - 51 fighters shot down by day . From 25 July 1944 , Welter served with 1 . " Staffel " / Nachtjagdgruppe 10 ( NJGr 10 ) performing further " Wilde Sau " missions . He claimed four Royal Air Force ( RAF ) Lancaster four - engine bombers shot down on the night of 29 August 1944 to record his 24th through 27th victories . Welter transferred to 10 . / JG 300 on 4 September 1944 . 10 . " Staffel " / JG 300 was established to counter intrusions by RAF Mosquito twin - engined bombers , flying specially optimized for speed Bf 109G - 6 / AS fighters . In September , Welter claimed seven Mosquitos downed , including one by ramming . It is thought that during his service with 1 . / NJG 10 and 10 . / JG 300 , Welter recorded 12 victories in only 18 missions . On the night of 19 September 1944 , Welter may have shot down Wing Commander Guy Gibson who was leading a 300 - bomber attack on Mönchengladbach and Rheydt . Gibson ' s Mosquito crashed near Steenbergen in the Netherlands . Welter was the only German pilot to have claimed a Mosquito shot down that night and Gibson ' s Mosquito the only Mosquito lost . Welter was awarded the Knight ' s Cross of the Iron Cross on 18 October 1944 for 33 victories in just 40 missions . On 2 November 1944 , Welter was transferred to II . " Gruppe " / Nachtjagdgeschwader 11 ( NJG 11 ) , a reformation of his former unit . Here he was given command of a special Kommando subordinate to II . / NJG11 , set up on 11 November 1944 at Rechlin - Lärz ( 2 November 1944 – 28 January 1945 ) , and dedicated to the nocturnal interception with the Messerschmitt Me 262 jet fighter of RAF Mosquitos attacking the Berlin area . According to some sources , " Oberleutnant " Welter added a Lancaster to his growing list of Mosquitos on the night of 12 December 1944 , the first night victory by a jet fighter . Other sources state that his first aerial victory flying the Me 262 was claimed either on the night of 2 January 1945 or 5 January 1945 . On 28 January 1945 , the unit initially known as Sonderkommando Stamp , named after its founder " Major " Gerhard Stamp and then " Sonderkommando Welter " , was re - designated 10 . " Staffel " / NJG 11 and transferred to the airfield at Burg near Magdeburg ( 28 January 1945 – 12 April 1945 ) . The unit was equipped with radar - less Me 262 jet fighters , and tasked with intercepting Mosquito bomber aircraft of No . 8 Group RAF in the Berlin area , with the aid of ground control and the searchlight defences , partially a " Wilde Sau " form of night combat . Welter had claimed three aerial victories while flying the Me 262 by early February 1945 . Thereafter , Welter made a string of questionable air combat claims against Mosquito aircraft in the Berlin area - three on the night of 21 February 1945 ( no Mosquitoes lost ) , and another three on the night of 2 March 1945 ( one Mosquito damaged in aerial combat ) . 10 . / NJG11 made further claims against Mosquito aircraft attacking Berlin on the nights of 21 March 1945 ( three claims ; one Mosquito lost ) , 23 March 1945 ( three claims ; one Mosquito lost , another damaged in aerial combat ) , 24 March 1945 ( two claims ; one Mosquito damaged in aerial combat ) , 27 March 1945 ( two claims ; two Mosquitos lost ) , 30 March 1945 ( four claims ; one Mosquito lost and another damaged in aerial combat ) , 2 April 1945 ( one claim ; one Mosquito lost ) , 3 April 1945 ( two claims ; one Mosquito lost and another damaged in aerial combat ) , and 19 April 1945 ( two claims , no Mosquitos lost ) . The last known aerial combat claim by Welter occurred on the night of 3 April 1945 , when a Mosquito of 139 Squadron , RAF , was shot down over Berlin . Welter was awarded the Knight ' s Cross with Oak Leaves on 11 March 1945 for 48 victories . Much of the controversy and myth surrounding Welter ' s claims for success in nocturnal aerial combat with the Me 262 stems from a memorandum written by Welter on 29 May 1945 for the benefit of his British captors . In this memorandum Welter stated that between December 1944 and the end of January 1945 , as the sole pilot of Kommando Welter , he flew seven Me 262 sorties and achieved three victories against Mosquito aircraft and two victories against Lancaster aircraft . Welter further stated that from the formation of 10 . / NJG 11 on 28 January 1945 to the end of the war , 10 . / NJG 11 flew around another 63 operational sorties and claimed a further 38 victories against Mosquito aircraft at night and five victories against Mosquito aircraft by day ; his share being 20 Mosquitos at night and two during the day . Thus , according to the memo , a total of 25 Mosquitoes and two Lancasters were claimed in aerial combat by Welter , flying the Me 262 with the Kommando / " Staffel " , while other pilots of the " Staffel " claimed a further 21 kills ( of which three were achieved with the two - seater Me 262 ) . Official Luftwaffe documents show that by the 4 April 1945 , 10 . / NJG 11 had claimed 34 aerial victories , of which only one was claimed in a two - seater Me262 . Research of RAF records show that only a maximum of 15 Mosquitoes could have been possibly destroyed by Kommando Welter — 10 . / NJG 11 . Officially Kurt Welter was credited with 63 victories in 93 missions , of which 56 victories were achieved at night and seven by day . Among his claimed 63 victories are up to 33 Mosquitos . Thus , there remains some controversy about the exact number of victories achieved while flying the Me 262 , with only three of the Mosquito kills coinciding with RAF records : Welter may have been guilty of overclaiming Welter survived the war and was killed on 7 March 1949 in Leck in Schleswig - Holstein waiting at a level crossing , when logs falling from an improperly loaded passing train crushed his car .