At the beginning of 1944, II. Gruppe of Jagdgeschwader 54 was stationed in Vinnitsa in Ukraina. The 4./JG 54 was still posted to the III Gruppe at this time based at Ludwigslust in Home Defense.

The Gruppe, equipped with the Focke Wulf Fw 190 A, then moved to Ukrainian front and the base Uman in January and later on 5 March to Jakobstadt. A week later, on 12 March they transfered to Petschur outside Stalingrad followed, about 50 km west of the city of Pskov in the immediate vicinity of the border with Estonia.

After the start of the Russian summer offensive against Finland on 9 June 1944, the Gruppe was rushed to Finland. It was assigned to Gefechtsverband Kuhlmey, named after its commander Oberstlleutnant Kurt Kuhlmey and transferred to the airfield in Immola. On July 20 the Gruppe moved to Utti and then returned to Petschur in July.

In August they once more moved back to Germany ending up at Wenden. Here on 15 August, the II Gruppe was reorganized and reinforced to four Staffel. The 4th and 6th Staffeln was renamed to the 15th and 16th Staffeln and transferred to IV./JG 54. As a result, the Gruppe was assigned the 4./ KG 2 as the new 8th Staffeln.

In October, the reorganization of 6 and 7 Staffeln began. On September 22 1944 the Gruppe moved to Riga-Spilve and in October to Libau.

At the start of 1945 the II. Gruppe of Jagdgeschwader 54 was based in Libau. Here the January 5th and 8th Staffel was transferred to Cirava in Latvia but returned to the Gruppe in March 1945. In March the Gruppe was transferred to East Preussia and the base situated at Heiligenbeil south of Königsberg.

Finally at the end of the war Hptm. Herbert Findeisen, with his II./JG 54 was flew out of the Curland Pocket to Flensburg near the Danish border, where they surrender to the British.

This particular Fw 190 A-8 was photographed by the Russians belly landed in the area of Küstrin, downed by unknown resons. The 21 years old pilot Lt. Ulrich Neitzke is still listed as MIA.

This Fw 190 A-8 flown by Lt. Neitzke would be published in my next profile book, Profile book No 16, due to be published in March/April 2026.