Messerschmitt Bf.109E - Croatian users

After the defeat of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Independent State of Croatia was founded in April 1941 and later, in June the Croatian Legion was founded by Ante Pavelic to support German troops on the Eastern Front. The air arm was stablished shortly after, on 12th July, named 4.Mesovita Zrakoplovna Pukovnija (4th Mixed Air Force Regiment) with both fighter and bomber units.
The fighter group was sent to Germany to be trained on the piloting of the Bf.109 (they were trained with outdated Bf.109D which we published on an earlier post) and after the training was over, in September 1941, they were sent to the Eastern Front.
They were equipped mainly with Bf.109Es and some Bf.109Fs. The squadron was officially designated 15.(kroat)/JG.52 and were part of, JG.52 and arrived in Poltava, in USSR, on 6th October and by 9th October they already were flying in their first combat sortie where they shot down a Soviet Kharkiv R-10, however, it seems that the kill was scored by the German liaison officer in the squadron. At the end of October they were rebased to Taganrog, in Rostov region where they remained until 1st December and here the Croatians managed to score some kills. On that same day, 1st December they were rebased to Mariupol, in the east of Ukraine. From there they performed various ground-support missions mainly by attacking Soviet supply columns and escorting German bombers. 
In May 1942 they were rebased to Crimea and shortly after to Artemovka-Konstantinovka, in central Ukraine from where they performed aerial control missions in Sevastopol and Sea of Azov areas, still flying the Bf.109E which were already outdated. By this time, considering that most of Luftwaffe's units were already flying the Bf.109f or even the earlier versions of the Bf.109G, and that the squadron already flew their 1000th sortie, the pilots issued a complaint and, four days later from that complain the squadron was given a three month rest and the some pilots were transferred to Berlin to be trained on the Bf.109G. During that three month period the Bf.109Es were replaced by the much better Bf.109G-2.

Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Bf_109_operational_history
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croatian_Air_Force_Legion
3. Osprey - Aicraft of the Aces 49 - Croatian aces of World War II
4. Salamander Books - The Complete Book of Fighters