It was a relatively sophisticated design that possessed a variety of innovations, including a pressurized cockpit, twin ejection seats and remotely controlled defensive gun turrets.

The P.1055 was initially rejected by the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (RLM – the German Aviation Ministry), but Heinkel promptly reconfigured it as a night fighter, designated P.1060.

Both the development and production of the He 219 were protracted due to various factors, including political rivalries between Josef Kammhuber, commander of the German night fighter forces, Ernst Heinkel, the manufacturer and Erhard Milch, responsible for aircraft construction in the RLM.

Nevertheless, the He 219 made its combat debut on June 1943 and was quickly recognised for its value as a night fighter, even being allegedly effective against the Royal Air Force's de Havilland Mosquito fighter-bombers.

Had the He 219 ever become available to the Luftwaffe in large quantities, it is plausible that it could have had a significant effect against the strategic night bombing offensive conducted against Germany by the Royal Air Force (RAF); however, only 268 aircraft across all models were ever completed and thus the type only saw limited service between 1943 and 1945.

[5] During the summer of 1940, Robert Lusser returned to Heinkel from Messerschmitt and immediately began work on a new high-speed bomber project designated P.1055.

The glazed canopy of the cockpit was faired into the nose of the aircraft and provided excellent external visibility for its two occupants, who were seated in an atypical back-to-back configuration.

[citation needed] About the same time as Lusser was designing the P.1055, Kammhuber had started looking for an aircraft for his rapidly growing night fighter force.

[13] One problem was that the He 219 possessed less stability than desired; to overcome this, Heinkel offered a cash prize to engineers to develop corrective measures.

[13] The same month, the He 219 programme was dealt a major blow when Heinkel's works at Rostock were struck by an RAF bombing raid which, amongst other things, destroyed three-quarters of the drawings; soon afterwards, the design office was transferred to Vienna.

Eric Brown - who flew several He 219 A-2s after the conflict - the He 219 was "decidedly underpowered" (his italics) and the "rate of climb was certainly unimpressive" and found it to be "short on performance to deal with the Mosquito".

[citation needed] The first planned version to reach production was the He 219 A-2 model, which had longer engine nacelles containing extra fuel tanks, unitized 1670 PS DB 603AA engines with higher critical altitude and often also two 30 mm (1.18 in) MK 108 cannon, as an offensive Schräge Musik upward-firing system completely contained within the rear fuselage, with the cannons' muzzles even with the dorsal fuselage surface.

[32] The A-2 featured an updated, 90 MHz VHF-band Telefunken FuG 220 Lichtenstein SN-2 radar system, complete with its larger, high-drag 4 × 2-dipole element Hirschgeweih aerials.

Typically, ground control would dispatch aircraft into the right area, at which point the pilots took over and guided themselves towards the bombers using information from their onboard Lichtenstein VHF radar.

[citation needed] The He 219 was the only piston-engined night fighter capable of combat with the Mosquito on equal terms, given its speed, manoeuvrability and firepower,[33] however, it was never able to play a significant role in the conflict because Germany's industrial base failing to produce it in sufficient numbers.

[citation needed] The follow-on series to the He 219As in service was to be the He 219B fitted with the new 1,864 kW (2,500 hp) Junkers Jumo 222A/B 24-cylinder engines which would have allowed the He 219 to reach 700 km/h (440 mph).

[citation needed] A further adaptation would have been the He 219C, also intended to use the B-series design's big wing and Jumo 222 powerplants as well as an all-new fuselage of 17.15 m (56.27 ft), with a complete three-man Ju 388J cockpit section forward, converted to accept the He 219A's standard nose gear layout the Borsig-designed Hecklafette HL 131V "quadmount", hydraulic-powered four-gun manned tail turret intended for later He 177A versions and the He 177B-5, as well as more than one Amerikabomber strategic bomber design competitor.

[35] Day bomber and night fighter versions were proposed and metal was cut for the project but since the 1,500-kW Jumo 222 engines remained experimental they never flew.

[citation needed] Paper projects include the very-high-altitude He 219E with a vastly increased wingspan of 28.5 m (93.5 ft) and 1,500 kW (2,000 PS) output rated DB 614 engines, which were apparently a further-uprated version of the never-produced DB 603G inverted V12, capable of the desired 1,491 kW (2,000 hp) power output level that Germany were unable to develop into a reliable powerplant.

Since this design was also meant to be powered by the ill-fated Jumo 222 it never flew, although work continued on two sets of wings until they were destroyed by Allied bombing.

[citation needed] When the war had ended in Europe, the U.S. Army Air Forces Intelligence Service, as part of "Operation LUSTY" (Luftwaffe Secret Technology), took control of three He 219s at the Grove base of the 1st Night Fighter Wing (Nachtjagdgeschwader 1) in Jutland, Denmark starting on 16 June 1945.

Although severely damaged and missing many parts, the remains of this aircraft was preserved and then put on display at the Forsvars- og Garnisonsmuseum in Aalborg, Denmark.