Messerschmitt AG () was a German
share-ownership limited,
aircraft manufacturing corporation named after its chief designer
Willy Messerschmitt
Wilhelm Emil "Willy" Messerschmitt (; 26 June 1898 – 15 September 1978) was a German aircraft designer and manufacturer. In 1934, in collaboration with Walter Rethel, he designed the Messerschmitt Bf 109, which became the most importan ...
from
mid-July 1938 onwards, and known primarily for its
World War II fighter aircraft
Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield ...
, in particular the
Bf 109
The Messerschmitt Bf 109 is a German World War II fighter aircraft that was, along with the Focke-Wulf Fw 190, the backbone of the Luftwaffe's fighter force. The Bf 109 first saw operational service in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War an ...
and
Me 262. The company survived in the post-war era, undergoing a number of mergers and changing its name from Messerschmitt to
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB) was a West German aerospace manufacturer. It was formed during the late 1960s as the result of efforts to consolidate the West German aerospace industry; aircraft manufacturer Messerschmitt AG merged with the civi ...
before being bought by Deutsche Aerospace (
DASA, now part of
Airbus) in 1989.
History
Background
In February 1916, the south German engineering company
MAN AG and several banks purchased the unprofitable aircraft builder
Otto-Flugzeugwerke
Gustav Otto Flugmaschinenfabrik was a pioneering German aircraft producer during the early part of the 20th century. Founded in 1910 by Gustav Otto in Bavaria, the firm was reorganized on 7 March 1916 into Bayerische Flugzeugwerke (BFW). In 1917, ...
, starting a new company, ''Bayerische Flugzeugwerke AG'' (abbreviated ''B.F.W.''). The articles of association were drawn up on 19 and 20 February, and completed on 2 March 1916. Details of the company were recorded in the Commercial Register with an equity capital of RM 1,000,000 on 7 March 1916. 36% of the capital was provided by the Bank für Handel und Industrie, Berlin, 30% by MAN AG and 34% by Hermann Bachstein, Berlin. The first Chairman of the Board of Management was Peter Eberwein, who had previously been employed at
Albatros Flugzeugwerke.
Due to the need for immediate aircraft production for the ongoing war, there was no time for development work and BFW manufactured aircraft under licence from
Albatros Flugzeugwerke. Within a month of being set up, the company was able to supply aircraft to the war ministries of
Prussia and
Bavaria. However, major quality problems were encountered at the start. The German air crews frequently complained about the serious defects that appeared in the first machines from BFW. The same thing had happened with the aircraft from the predecessor company run by Gustav Otto. It was only organizational changes and more intensive supervision of the assembly line that succeeded in resolving these problems by the end of 1916. BFW then started turning out over 200 aircraft a month, with their workforce growing to 3,000 and becoming one of the largest aircraft manufacturers in Bavaria.
The end of the war hit BFW hard, since military demand for aircraft collapsed. The company's management were forced to look for new products with which to maintain their position in the market. Since World War I aircraft were largely built from wood to keep their weight down, BFW was equipped with the very latest joinery plant. The company still held stocks of materials sufficient for about 200 aircraft, and worth 4.7 million reichsmarks. The machinery and the materials were then used for the production of furniture and fitted kitchens. In addition, from 1921 onwards, the company manufactured motorcycles of its own design under the names of Flink and Helios.
In the autumn of 1921, Austrian financier
Camillo Castiglioni first announced his interest in purchasing BFW. While most of the shareholders accepted his offer, MAN AG initially held on to its shareholding in BFW, but Castiglioni wanted to acquire all the shares. He was supported in this by BMW's Managing Director Franz Josef Popp who, in a letter to the chairman of MAN, described BFW as a "dead factory, which possesses no plant worth mentioning, and consists very largely of dilapidated and unsuitable wooden sheds situated in a town that is extremely unfavorable for industrial activities and whose status continues to give little cause for enthusiasm". Apparently Popp was still in close contact with Castiglioni and was perhaps even privy to the latter's plans for merging BMW with BFW. It was probably in the spring of 1922 that Castiglioni and Popp persuaded MAN to give up its shares in BFW, so that now the company belonged exclusively to Castiglioni. Then, in May of the same year, when the Italian-born investor was able to acquire BMW's engine business from
Knorr-Bremse AG, nothing more stood in the way of a merger between the aircraft company BFW and the engine builders BMW.
Reestablishment
Bayerische Flugzeugwerke (BFW) (Bavarian Aircraft Works) was reformed in 1926, in
Augsburg,
Bavaria, when
Udet Flugzeugbau GmbH was changed into a joint-stock company. In the early stages, BMW AG held a stake in this company and was represented by
Josef Popp, who held a place on the Supervisory Board.
Willy Messerschmitt
Wilhelm Emil "Willy" Messerschmitt (; 26 June 1898 – 15 September 1978) was a German aircraft designer and manufacturer. In 1934, in collaboration with Walter Rethel, he designed the Messerschmitt Bf 109, which became the most importan ...
joined the company in 1927 as chief designer and engineer and formed a design team.
One of the first designs, the
Messerschmitt M20, was a near-catastrophe for the designer and the company. Many of the prototypes crashed, one of them killing Hans Hackmack, a close friend of
Erhard Milch, the head of
Deutsche Luft Hansa and the German civil aviation authorities. Milch was upset by the lack of response from Messerschmitt and this led to a lifelong hatred towards him. Milch eventually cancelled all contracts with Messerschmitt and forced BFW into bankruptcy in 1931. However, Messerschmitt's friendship with
Hugo Junkers prevented a stagnation of the careers of him and BFW, which was started again in 1933. Milch still prevented Messerschmitt's takeover of the BFW until 1938, hence the designation "Bf" of early Messerschmitt designs.
Messerschmitt promoted a concept he called "light weight construction" in which many typically separate load-bearing parts were merged into a single reinforced firewall, thereby saving weight and improving performance. The first true test of the concept was in the
Bf 108 ''Taifun'' sports aircraft, which would soon be setting all sorts of records. Based on this performance the company was invited to submit a design for the
Luftwaffe's 1935 fighter contest, winning it with the
Bf 109
The Messerschmitt Bf 109 is a German World War II fighter aircraft that was, along with the Focke-Wulf Fw 190, the backbone of the Luftwaffe's fighter force. The Bf 109 first saw operational service in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War an ...
, based on the same construction methods.
From this point on Messerschmitt became a favorite of the
Nazi party, as much for his designs as his political abilities and the factory location in southern Germany away from the "clumping" of aviation firms on the northern coast. BFW was reconstituted as "Messerschmitt AG" on 11 July 1938, with Willy Messerschmitt as chairman and managing director. The renaming of BFW resulted in the company's
RLM designation prefix changing from "Bf" to "Me" for all newer designs that were accepted by the RLM after the acquisition date. Existing types, such as the Bf 109 and 110, retained their earlier designation in official documents, although sometimes the newer designations were used as well, most often by subcontractors, such as Erla Maschinenwerk of
Leipzig. In practice, all BFW/Messerschmitt aircraft from the Bf 108 four-seat touring monoplane, to the Bf 163 light observation aircraft (which competed unsuccessfully for the government contract won by the rival
Fieseler Fi 156 design) were prefixed "Bf", all later types with "Me".
World War II

During the war Messerschmitt became a major design supplier, their
Bf 109
The Messerschmitt Bf 109 is a German World War II fighter aircraft that was, along with the Focke-Wulf Fw 190, the backbone of the Luftwaffe's fighter force. The Bf 109 first saw operational service in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War an ...
and
Bf 110 forming the vast majority of fighter strength for the first half of the war. Several other designs were also ordered, including the enormous
Me 321
The Messerschmitt Me 321 ''Gigant'' was a large German cargo glider developed and used during World War II. Intended to support large scale invasions, the Me 321 saw very limited use due to the low availability of suitable tug aircraft, high vuln ...
''Gigant'' transport glider, and its six-engined follow on, the
Me 323
The Messerschmitt Me 323 ''Gigant'' ("Giant") was a German military transport aircraft of World War II. It was a powered variant of the Me 321 military glider and was the largest land-based transport aircraft to fly during the war. A total of 2 ...
. However, for the second half of the war, Messerschmitt turned almost entirely to
jet
Jet, Jets, or The Jet(s) may refer to:
Aerospace
* Jet aircraft, an aircraft propelled by jet engines
** Jet airliner
** Jet engine
** Jet fuel
* Jet Airways, an Indian airline
* Wind Jet (ICAO: JET), an Italian airline
* Journey to Enceladus a ...
-powered designs, producing the world's first operational jet fighter, the
Me 262 ''Schwalbe'' ("Swallow"). They also produced the
DFS-designed
Me 163
The Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet is a rocket-powered interceptor aircraft primarily designed and produced by the German aircraft manufacturer Messerschmitt. It is the only operational rocket-powered fighter aircraft in history as well as th ...
''Komet'', the first
rocket-powered design to enter service. Messerschmitt relied heavily on slave labour to produce much of the parts needed for these aircraft during the second half of World War II; these parts were assembled in an enormous tunnel system in
Sankt Georgen an der Gusen,
Austria. Slave labour was provided by inmates of the brutal
KZ Gusen I and Gusen II camps, and by inmates from nearby
Mauthausen concentration camp, all located near the St. Gorgen quarries. 40,000 inmates from Spain, Italy, Poland, Slovenia, France, Russia, Hungarian Jews and twenty other nationalities were murdered during the production of these aircraft at
KZ Gusen. Messerschmitt officials maintained barracks at the concentration camp to oversee the work being done by the inmates. Messerschmitt, and its executive
Willy Messerschmitt
Wilhelm Emil "Willy" Messerschmitt (; 26 June 1898 – 15 September 1978) was a German aircraft designer and manufacturer. In 1934, in collaboration with Walter Rethel, he designed the Messerschmitt Bf 109, which became the most importan ...
also occupied the famed
Villa Tugendhat
Villa Tugendhat is an architecturally significant building in Brno, Czech Republic. It is one of the pioneering prototypes of modern architecture in Europe, and was designed by the German architects Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich. It w ...
in
Brno
Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...
,
Czech Republic, designed by
Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ( ; ; born Maria Ludwig Michael Mies; March 27, 1886August 17, 1969) was a German-American architect. He was commonly referred to as Mies, his surname. Along with Alvar Aalto, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius and Frank Lloyd ...
and
Lilly Reich in the 1920s; the Messerschmitt aircraft factory office and the
Gestapo occupied the property during the war.
Messerschmitt had its share of poor designs as well; the
Me 210, designed as a follow-on to the 110, was an aerodynamic disaster that almost led to the forced dissolution of the company. The design problems were eventually addressed in the
Me 410
The Messerschmitt Me 410 ''Hornisse'' (Hornet) is a German heavy fighter and ''Schnellbomber'' used by the ''Luftwaffe'' during World War II. Though an incremental improvement of the Me 210, it had a new wing plan, longer fuselage and engine ...
''Hornisse'', but only small numbers were built before all attention turned to the 262. Later in the war, in competition with the
Junkers Ju 390 and the unbuilt, February 1943-initiated
Heinkel He 277, Messerschmitt also worked on a heavy ''
Amerika Bomber'' design, the
Me 264, which flew in prototype form — with three prototype airframes built, the first of which flew in December 1942 — but was too late to see combat.
Post-war
For ten years after
World War II, the company was not allowed to produce aircraft. One alternative the company came up with was the three-wheeled
motorcycle/
bubble car or Kabinenroller (cabinscooter)
KR175 /
KR200, designed by an aircraft engineer,
Fritz Fend.
The cars were actually made by Fend's own company in the Messerschmitt works at Regensburg, and
Willy Messerschmitt
Wilhelm Emil "Willy" Messerschmitt (; 26 June 1898 – 15 September 1978) was a German aircraft designer and manufacturer. In 1934, in collaboration with Walter Rethel, he designed the Messerschmitt Bf 109, which became the most importan ...
had very little to do with the vehicles other than ruling that they carried his name. Production of the KR200 ceased in 1964.
The Messerschmitt factory also produced prefabricated houses, which were designed as "self-building-kits" mainly based on an alloy framework.
Return to aviation
On 6 June 1968, Messerschmitt AG merged with the small civil engineering and civil aviation firm
Bölkow
Bölkow was a West German aircraft manufacturer based in Stuttgart, Germany, and later Ottobrunn.
History
The company was founded in 1948 by Ludwig Bölkow, who since 1955 with Emil Weiland had developed helicopters for Bölkow Entwicklungen KG.
...
, becoming Messerschmitt-Bölkow. The following May, the firm acquired
Hamburger Flugzeugbau
''Hamburger Flugzeugbau'' (HFB) was an aircraft manufacturer, located primarily in the Finkenwerder quarter of Hamburg, Germany. Established in 1933 as an offshoot of Blohm & Voss shipbuilders, it later became an operating division within its pare ...
(HFB). The company then changed its name to
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB) was a West German aerospace manufacturer. It was formed during the late 1960s as the result of efforts to consolidate the West German aerospace industry; aircraft manufacturer Messerschmitt AG merged with the civi ...
(MBB). In 1989 MBB was taken over by
DASA. DASA later operated as "EADS Germany", which is now
Airbus.
[Answers.com (n.d.)]
Retrieved 22 March 2007.
Aircraft
Other types of aircraft
*
Messerschmitt Me 109TL
Missiles
*
Enzian
See also
*
List of RLM aircraft designations
*
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB) was a West German aerospace manufacturer. It was formed during the late 1960s as the result of efforts to consolidate the West German aerospace industry; aircraft manufacturer Messerschmitt AG merged with the civi ...
References
External links
{{Authority control
Defunct aircraft manufacturers of Germany
Defunct motor vehicle manufacturers of Germany
Companies based in Augsburg
Companies involved in the Holocaust