Messerschmitt Me.262. Part five.

On 19th April 1944 Erprobungskommando 262 was formed south of Augsburg. It was a test unit to introduce the Me.262 into service and train a corps of pilots to fly it. It wasn't until 26th July that Lt. Alfred Schreiber damaged a reconnaissance Mosquito that the Me.262 saw action for the first time.
After the death of Hptm. Werner Thierfelder, Walter Nowotny took command of the unit, and was therefore renamed as Kommando Nowotny in July 1944. It was basically a trials and development unit which mounted world's first jet fighter operations. Operational trials continued during August 1944 with the unit claiming 19 Allied aircraft destroyed in exchange of six Me.262s lost.
In spite of the orders to stay grounded, Nowotny chose to fly a mission against an enemy bomber formation flying at 9100m (30000ft.) high on 8th November 1944. He claimed to have taken down two P-51 Mustangs before suffering an engine malfunction at such high altitude. Then, when he was diving to try to restart the engines, he was attacked by another Mustangs, forced to bail out and died. This forced the Kommando to be withdrawn for further flight training and review their combat tactics to focus on Me.262's strengths.
Shortly after, on 26th November, came the first confirmed ground-to-air kill of a jet combat aircraft when a Me.262 of the III. Gruppe/KG.51 was shot down by anti-air fire when attacking a RAF airfield near Eindhoven, in the Netherlands.
By January 1945 the JG.7 was formed as a purely jet fighter wing. It was based at Parchim, in Germany, but it wasn't until several weeks later that the unit became fully operational. Another unit, was reformed before, the I Gruppe/KG(J) 54 in October 1944. It was re-equipped with Me.262A-2a fighter-bomber for ground support roles. However, it lost 12 jets in action during the course of two weeks with minimal accomplishments. Jagverband 44 (JV 44) was another squadron-sized jet fighter unit which was formed in February 1945 by Lt.Gen. Adolf Galland who had recently been dismished as inspector of fighters. He was able to draw many experienced pilots from other fighter units that were grounded due to the lack of fuel.
During March 1945 the Me.262 fighter units were able, for the first time, to set-up large-scale attacks against Allied bomber formations. On 18th March thirty-seven Me.262 of the JG.7 intercepted an enormous force of 1221 bombers escorted by 632 fighters. Twelve bombers and one fighter were shot down with the lost of three Me.262s. Although a kill-to-loss ratio of 4:1 is what the Luftwaffe would've needed to make an impact on the war, the scale of their success was minor as they only represented a 1% of the attacking force.

Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Me_262
2. https://www.valka.cz/Messerschmitt-Me-262-t15721
3. Salamander Books - The Complete Book of Fighters