By ARIEL DAVID
The Associated Press
Tuesday, August 14, 2007; 8:50 PM

ROME -- A group of researchers has located the remains and plane of a German ace shot down during World War II and also discovered some personal effects, including the dog tag and good luck charms the pilot carried into combat, a spokesman said Tuesday.

The amateur researchers found the plane flown by Flight Sgt. Maximilian Volke _ a Munich-born pilot credited with shooting down 37 planes _ near the site of the German defensive line that witnessed months of bloody battles as the Allies fought to liberate northern Italy.

Searchers located the plane after narrowing their area based on information from state archives and eyewitness accounts of the ace's final air battle in 1944, said Leo Venieri, president of Romagna Air Finders, a group that scours the northern Italian region of Emilia Romagna for signs of missing World II pilots.

Volke's Messerschmitt Bf 109 was dug out of a farmer's field just north of Modena in July. The pilot's remains were well preserved, Venieri said.

The dig also yielded a number of artifacts, including a wallet with money, documents and images of the Virgin Mary and an African elephant.

Volke took off from a northern Italian air base on Sept. 5 with three other fighters to intercept a group of American bombers. He was shot down by gunners in one of the U.S. planes, Venieri said, citing witness accounts and the bomber squadron's logs.

The pilot's remains have been sent to the University of Modena for an autopsy and Venieri's group plans to bury him in September at the German war cemetery of Passo della Futa, between Bologna and Florence.

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Associated Press reporter David Rising in Berlin contributed to this report.