Polish 111th Fighter Escadrille

The 111th Fighter Escadrille of the Polish Air Force (Polish: 111. eskadra myśliwska) was one of the fighter units of the Polish Army. Created in 1921, immediately after the end of the Polish-Soviet War, the unit inherited the traditions of the famous war-time Polish 7th Air Escadrille (known as the Kościuszko Squadron), in which both Polish and American volunteers served.

The unit was created on May 19, 1921 out of two previously-existing units, the Polish 7th Air Escadrille and the Polish 18th Air Escadrille of the 1st Air Regiment. Initially it was manned mostly by the American veterans of the earlier unit, including Cedric Fauntleroy. However, soon afterwards most of the American pilots returned home and the unit was manned with Polish officers. Nonetheless, it retained the roundel and the traditions of the Polish-American unit. In 1934 the unit was the first to receive the then-modern PZL P.11c fighters. In 1936 the escadrille was stationed in Sarny and was providing air cover for a construction of border fortifications at the frontier with the Soviet Union. During one of the sorties Lt. Witold Urbanowicz, later to become one of the fighter aces of World War II, downed a Soviet Polikarpov R-5 biplane reconnaissance aircraft flying a reconnaissance mission over the area.

In 1939 it was attached to the Pursuit Brigade, a large fighter unit held in reserve of the Commander in Chief. As part of the Polish 3rd Squadron of the 1st Air Regiment (Polish: III/1 dywizjon myśliwski) under Zdzisław Krasnodębski, the unit was stationed at the airfield at Zielonka and provided air cover for the nearby city of Warsaw. During the Polish September Campaign the first sortie — and the first success of the escadrille — took place on September 1, at 4 in the morning, that is roughly an hour before the fights for Westerplatte started, an event which is usually taken as the starting point of World War II. The escadrille was scrambled to intercept a large formation of enemy bombers escorted by Messerschmitt Me110 heavy fighters. Over the area of Modlin the enemy formation was intercepted and forced to retreat, dropping their bombs on uninhabited areas. Lt. Palusiński downed one enemy Dornier Do17 and probably damaged another plane of that type. Palusiński himself was wounded by enemy fire.

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