bob lembke

One of the hospitals my father was in in 1917 was in a beer-brewing town in Bavaria, a town with 16 export breweries. In each ward there sat a tapped keg of beer. The head nurse in my father's ward was a big nun, and, having nothing better to do, pop kept track of how much beer she drank in a day's shift. 16 liters, or four gallons and one quart. And the sisters had lunch in a separate dining hall, and it would be hard to believe that she took her lunch dry. One mug at lunch, and we are topping four gallons, two quarts.

I await, with bated breath, any feedback stating if I have breached any standards of propriety, or if such standards exist. Other tales come to mind. I don't know how many of the forum's participants are sons or daughters of Great War combat veterans, and can pass along direct "hand me down" anecdotes of life in the Great War. Most of my father's candid anecdotes about social life in his youth (at war) were at his own expense, the perplexities and even terror of interactions with much more experienced women. And after the war, with so many men dead or seriously disabled, sometimes the social scene was bizarre. I really have to finally write my father's military biography.

Well, the topic has been breeched, a bit. I have at least two stories about sex and military hospitals that are worth repeating. First the milder, perhaps. My father spent much of 1917 in and out of military hospitals, which probably saved his life. He had a severe arm wound suffered on Dead Man's Hill (Morte Homme) at Verdun in December 1916, which was infected for a great while and which spit bone for over 10 years. He was in a variety of hospitals with different types of nurses, sometimes nuns. One was staffed by "society lady" volunteers, women of the local upper class. After the war my father visited this town and met a couple of these women that he had gotten to know. Over coffee and cake, they chatted. Finally one of the women said: "Georg, you must tell us something. A very unusual thing happened, and we have never been able to figure it out. Late one night the watchman was making his rounds, and he found patient Xxxxxx lying on a pool table, far from his bed. The problem was that Xxxxxx had lost his legs, we have never figured out how he got there, or why. We asked him many times, but he refused to say." My father uttered the simple explanation, and one of the women laughed so forcefully that she spit coffee and cake all over my father, and she was mortified at this great breech of manners. The soldier's girlfriend was in town, and a plot was hatched. The ambulatory patients let the girl into the hospital late at night, and others picked up and carried the legless patient down into a remote part of the building, for the two of them to have some intimacy. But at the worst possible moment the night watchman approached on his rounds, and the men waiting nearby wisked the girl away, but could not have managed to get the fellow himself away without being discovered with their burden. So they left him on a pool table and fled. I once spent the night sleeping on a proper slate pool table, and I hope that they had not planned sexual gymnastics on the pool table itself, the damned things are awfully uncomfortable, literally "rock hard". Well, there is one of the stories I have in the area of "sex and military medicine". As a child I was treated as a little person, not some special child object, and I was told things and had access to materials that were quite adult, so to speak, in a very matter-of-fact Northern European fashion. Unlike the sterotypical combat veteran who never mentioned his war, my father endlessly told me about his experiences, also stating that it was the best time of his life, and after writing them down I have studied them and the Great War in parallel for 16 years, and of the things that can be checked, and I also have a lot of materials to use, including many family wartime letters, almost everything on 40 pages of oral history jibe perfectly, to my great surprise.

No, these are anecdotes my father told me. I was treated as a little adult, and sex stuff was mentioned to me. Some of the incidents occurred in hospital, he spent a lot of the war in hospitals. Since I never see such matters discussed, I may stay away from the topic. A while ago I was put on trial at another forum for insulting the majesty of the US, or something like that. I might send Kenneth a PM.

Kenneth; How to put this delicately? One aspect of my father's recollections of his WW I medical experiences, which he told me when I was a young lad, might be filed under "Sex in the Hospital". Should I go further? I have been active on a few military fora for over 10 years (on another forum I have over 4000 posts), and can't ever recall anyone mentioning the topic of sex. Bob

Chris; Are you suggesting that you have them? I just want to concoct a suitable formal bibliographical citation. Perhaps: "Lieutenant, RIR 16, Personal war diaries. As posted online at ?????." I agree, with a lot of "elbow grease" one might be able to figure out who he was, using a variety of sources, of course including a regimental history if one was written. I for one don't have the time to do so. Bob

Kenneth; An interesting aspect of the topic of Great War medical care is what I understand was the absolutely awful state of French medical care. (Here, again, I am working from memory on topics examined years ago.) I think that there is objective statistical evidence; I think that the rate of wounded French soldiers dying of their wounds was extremely high; I even think I remember an improbable statistic like three times the rate of well-set up medical services like Germany and the UK. An interesting side to this is a study of medical practice within Paris when besieged by the Germans in 1870. There was a major French-run hospital from which few seemed to survive, the staff had antiquated beliefs such as the deadly nature of night-time fresh air, while in comparison an American-run hospital had remarkably better survival rates, providing up to date care. Again, my father had an interesting story of a French (colonial) soldier who had a simple foot wound, but was denied either evacuation nor care, and was thrown into no-man's land to die by a French mainland unit which took over the sector; Germans, hearing him moan or plead, crawled out of their trench and were able to get him into their trench and then a German hospital. He had gas gangrene by that time, and the Germans performed multiple amputations, finally arresting the gangrene with a radical amputation at the hip joint. My father knew this as he was in the next bed, and he had fluent French. I have visions of an elderly man on crutches and one leg throwing stones at the last French evacuating from Algeria or Morocco. Bob

Chris; Could you say a bit more about the provenance of the diary, or to put it a bit differently, could you aid me with a suggested source citation? Were the diaries found somewhere, so that the author was not known? (Usually a diary might come thru the family and therefore the author is known.) I read thru it and found a few mentions of topics that I have interest in and wish to enter the data points into my timelines. Thanks for bringing the interesting account to our attention. Bob

I have many letters written by my father during WW I, and one or two of them mention him getting a rail pass and traveling to get an X-ray for an arm wound suffered at Verdun which troubled him for over ten years. This is from memory, and I cannot remember if he mentioned precisely where he went for the X-ray. He lay in no-man's land for three days before being recovered, and he had a bad wound in the back of his left arm whose recurrent infection kept him in and out of hospitals for most of 1917. His Militaerpass has the evaluation "fit for combat, but not Flammenwerfer", so he spent the war till late 1918 in Berlin training fresh Flammenwerfer troops. Wanting to get back to combat, he tricked his way to the front and then managed to get wounded twice in a month, the second time being blinded by gas during a flame attack; luckily he got his sight back rather quickly. "No good dead goes unpunished." If anyone is studying this topic seriously I could dig out the letter and give more detail about what he said, but there was not much detail. The history of his medical care, both from letters and his oral history, was fascinating.

Hi; Did he include his first name, or at least his first initial? My eyes are suffering at this hour. I used to get material from the German Postal Collectors' Society. (Not sure about the exact name.) Heard about books compiled that for different times over the war gives a correlation between Feldpost Stationen Nummern and various dates with the units, say divisions, where the post stations were located and served. Got to go to bed, about to fall over. My Father was Pion. Georg Lembke; served in 2nd Komp. late 1916, badly wounded, for a while associated with 2. Komp., then was certified as "fit for combat, but not with the flame-thrower" (from his Militaer=Pass), and went to Berlin to train new Flamm=Pioniern. Late in 1918 he wanted to get to the front, tricked the administration, and for his trouble was wounded two times again in a month of fighting. At the front he was in the 10. Komp. or 11. Komp. I have it in my materials. That was near Reims. My German probably horrible, haven't used it in about three years. Bob Lembke

Hello, Preuss! I have been away from my WK I studies for about three years, and I have completed my assignment (building six gorgeous kitchens), and now am coming back. The name Leutnant Hornung seems familiar. When my father was with 2 Komp. they were stationed in Stenay-sur-Meuse, and the Crown Prince often dropped into the company (he and his father were patrons, with money as well as with influence), at least once with his father. (I had beer and pizza a while ago with Prince Fritz of Preuss, and told him a very amusing story about the visit of his grand-father and great-grand-father to 2 Komp., and he got a hoot out of it.) When I get back into these studies I will try to find out if I have anything on Hornung. I even might have his signature. Bob Lembke

Prussian; I have quite a bit of information that should answer many of those questions, as I have accumulated, over 15 years, data on most of the Flammenwerfer engagements of the G=R=P=R during the war, often including the unit they were attacking with or supporting. My father joined the Regiment in the second half of 1916, joining the 2nd Komp., the one company remaining at Verdun, most of the companies had gone north to the Battle of the Somme. (My father wrote that he was delighted to not have gotten into that mess. I think that in the first half of 1916 the 2. Komp. did more fighting at Verdun than any other company, so that they deserved a relative rest. Despite this, my father was wounded twice, once on Hill 304, and once on Dead Man's Hill, the latter on 12/28/16, in that counter-attack to push the French back on the hill-top. He lay in a French dugout for three days before being found. Since you collect stuff, you might be discouraged to hear that my father kept his sleeve skull and crossbones patch, but that it upset my mother and she threw it away. Bob Lembke

Hi, Robin; Pardon my caution, but the placement of the badge on the pocket seems odd and impractical. Was it pinned to the flap? To the pocket? could the pocket open? In the real world, I would think that a real person would pin it to the middle of the pocket. The image stands out so vividly. It could easily be superimposed by a Photoshop artist, which might explain the awkward placement in the real world. Is the photo being sold? Is it an original or a modern copy? Is that another TK on the cap? If so, it seems authentic, but not dramatic. Bob Lembke

Glenn; Once again, thanks for your expert help. That makes a lot of sense, the big guns were being designed and built to bust up those foreign fortresses, so then of course the 4th Department would be a logical source for pressure to improve those guns. The first model came out in 1893, and then I assume they started thinking on how to improve the guns. In the Ranglisten of the period the Great General Staff is given an address of Berlin; the General Staff is given no address; logical, as its personnel were all over the place. In Kabisch's account an infantry regiment stationed at Aachen, at mobilization, sent a General Staff Oberleutnant attached to the regiment as an observer to the Great General Staff at Berlin by express train to pick up the "final mobilization orders" and the "secret war map" and bring the final orders back to Aachen before the regiment marched out. Bob Lembke

I am researching the development of the heavy German siege guns in late 19th Century and the early 20th Century. I am currently reading a source by Generalleutnant Kabisch. He mentions several General Staff officers and departments that participated in decision-making. He first mentioned that "the 4th Section of the Great General Staff (the heavy artilleryman General Deines was the responsible 'Oberquartiermeister' " was responsible for pressing for improvements in the first 30.5 cm mortars. What was the "4th Section of the Great General Staff"? None of my references clarify this. In WK II the "Oberquartiermeister IV" was the chief of the Intelligence Section at the German Command. I have about 40 Ranglisten, so I can trace Deines' career, but I am trying to figure out what and where the "4th Section was and its functions. I am studying the decision-making involved in the development of these weapons, and the personalities that participated in this work. As the development of these guns was a secret, and I have discovered that the officers involved even had to swear special oaths of secrecy in regard to this work, there is a lot less information available in this area of study. (For example, my grandfather was quite involved in the use of these weapons in Belgium and Russia, but his letters, mentioning them, never stated their exact caliber, but described them by approximate shell weight.) Additionally, a bit later, there was a similar idea, to make the initial 42 cm howitzers, which were astonishingly heavy (well over 100 tons, I think, I have the exact figures about) lighter, so that they could be transported by road or Feldbahn as well as by full-gauge railroad (the earlier decision mentioned above was to produce a more mobile version of the 30.5 cm mortar); Kabish stated that the idea was promoted by "the Artillery Section of the 'Aufmarschabteilung (Major Bauer)" . I am quite familiar with Major Bauer and his role in the development of new weapons, including flame throwers and poison gas. What was the Aufmarschabteilung, where was it situated organizationally (and physically, Berlin?), and what is a good translation of the term? Was it an office for planning mobilization? What was the relation of the Great General Staff to the General Staff? (I know that it was a section of same, seemingly.) Anyone chiming in with better translations of these terms will receive great hosannahas and obscure aromatic herbs will burned at your idol. Any further research suggesations gratefully received. Language not important. (Currently 99% of my reading is in German, French, and Flemish.) A research partner and I are writing what I think will be a definative study of the development and use of the "heaviest artillery", German, and probably the Austrian guns, and also of the fortifications that they reduced, and their defenders. But don't hold your breath, it will be exhaustive Any good source on the General Staff? My one specific source dates to about 1885. Many thanks in advance! Bob Lembke

Did you buy it, Hardy?

I would have to lean toward Gruss in contrast to Larcade, despite the latter being a nice book. A lot of the materials Gruss relied on in writing his thesis were soon destroyed in WW II. Additionally, when my father was stationed in Stenay-sur-Meuse, the Crown Prince visited the barracks of the 2. Kompagnie, G=R=P=R repeatedly. Besides telling me that in the 1950's, I have letters from my father to his father written from Stenay in 1916 mentioning the visits, and also mentioning his caging packs of 10 cigarettes that the Crown Prince gave to the men when interacting with them. On one occasion "little Wilhelm" brought his father, and of course there had to be an impromptu inspection, and in the course of it there was a very amusing incident and exchange between the Kaiser and one of the flame pioneers. A couple of years ago a friend of mine in Philadelphia called me and told me that he was having Prinz Fritz von Preussen and another German reserve officer over for beer and pizza, and asked me if I wanted to come over. Astonishingly, I accepted the invitation (truth be told, Prinz Fritz seemed to prefer his host's French brandy, not his beer), and had a very pleasant evening. I told Prinz Fritz the anecdote about the flame private's interaction with his great-grand-father, and he was quite amused. Where I am going with this, if the Kaiser expressed the opinion that the men of S=B Rohr should not wear "little Willi"'s monogram, I would think that they would not do it. I know of occasions when a formation of S=B Rohr was rolled out to serve as a Royal guard of honor. Disobedience to the expressed wishes of the Kaiser on matters of protocol and royal perogative seems to me unlikely, despite Rohr's good aroma. It should be mentioned that, at the very end of the war, when the Kaiser's very safety was in question, Rohr and his stormtroopers were summoned to protect the person of the Kaiser, not those cute Life Guards with their Royal pendant and big black boots. Bob

I think we are talking about different patches. Is Tom saying that that S=B Rohr was not officially authorized to wear the Crown Prince's monogram on their sleeve, they just started doing it? Or is he talking about men from Rohr wearing the flame pioneer's death's head patch? Both Major Dr. Reddemann and Rohr had a good and probably personal relationship with the Crown Prince, certainly Reddemann. Bob If this goes on I cannot respond as I am running out to dinner.

I know the answer to a certainty for Garde=Reserve=Pionier=Regiment (Flammenwerfer) , and I think 99% sure that the same answer applies to Sturm=Bataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr). If you were a member of the unit (after the distinction was conferred, 1916 for GRPR, 1918 I think for Rohr) you could wear the patch. My father was very, very naughty, in the eyes of the "brass", and he was extended no distinctions that he reasonably should have been given (except for his wound badge, they could hardly deny him that; he got his Iron Cross in 1921, and although he led a Trupp, they never promoted him past Pionier, he should have been at least a Gefreiter to lead a Trupp.), he wore the patch. I have a great patch story and I will post it soon. My father was posted to Rohr several times at Verdun and he found it a pleasure to work with those professionals. On the contrary, probably unfairly, he had something bordering on contempt for most line infantry. Frequently they would take a position, leave, and the infantry would lose it, and they would be asked to take it again. Once, after this happened twice, they burned off their remaining flame oil so that they could not be asked to do it a third time, of course risking their lives every time. Bob Lembke

It is hard to believe that the Garde=Pionier in Tom's photo has black shoulder-straps. I have several photos of groups of Garde=Pioniere that my father saved, in one about 30 men together, and typically one man in three had black shoulder-straps in these photos. Someone asked about the Pionier=Regiment Nr. 35. A useless but interesting factoid about that formation: Probably the only unit of its size, from WW I, that had four of its officers later win a Nobel Prize in Chemistry or Physics, including the tragic Fritz Haber. I am finding an association of the Death's Head with this unit somewhat of a stretch. The Garde=Reserve=Pionier=Regiment (Flammenwerfer) was only authorized to wear the patch in mid-1916, after its 150th flame attack, if memory serves, and only for the duration of the war. I think that it may have been 100 years (I may be wrong here, in detail) since any German unit had received authorization to put a Death's Head on their uniform. May 1915 was awfully early in the war. This sort of unit attracted visits from high brass; I can furnish a description of an important officer from the OHL visiting the unit and engaging in high-jinks with Dr. Haber. Who would tolerate a Pionier "unofficially" attaching the personal insignia of the Crown Prince to his uniform? This was not a Freikorps formation. Have followed this epic thread, but I am not especially interested in uniform details, nor expert in same. Most regrettably, my father retained one of his Totenkopf patches, but it frightened my mother, and she tossed it, probably in the 1950's. If it had not been lost it would have provided a very solid "chain of custody" for proof of authenticity. Bob Lembke

Ken; Do you have any mail? Envelopes from soldiers, by Prussian military mail regulation, were required to have an Absender Block on the envelope, usually written in two lines, highly abbreviated, sometimes up-side down, which have the sender's rank, last name, and unit, in a lot of detail, typically, regiment, battalion, company, and even Zug oder Korporalshaft. This often is priceless information. However, families typically keep letters but toss the envelopes. However, the Absender Block is also found on post cards, and many family photos, upon examination, will be found to be postcards that were then put in albums. This block of information is usually written at or near the top of the address/message side of the card, usually a bit to the left of the military stamps at the top right of the card. There also will be two or three of these stamps (I mean inked stamps, not postage stamps; a soldier or a family writing to a soldier during the war merely had to write "Feldpost" on the envelope/card and the mail went free). These stamps will often give the company, battalion, and/or regiment, these in rectangular stamps, and a round stamp will usually give the division and/or the number of the military post office, and even the day and hour of stamping by the post office. If you can't read the Absender Block if you post it I or someone else more comfortable with Suetterlin or Kurrent handwriting can help you, if you post the image. Bob

Some time after my first wife and I separated, I found some photos of her mother about the house, and got them back to the spousal unit. In the pictures her mother and at least one companion young woman were wearing one-piece bathing suits with large swastikas across the chest, at least 10 inches wide. Some of the suits and emblems were black on white, some white on black. I found it rather fitting, as the charming woman, a registered nurse and a "church lady", beat her children brutally and tormented them in other ways, and her death was almost met with glee from her children, much to my discomfort. Neither she nor anyone else on both sides of the family were German-American; they were English-Americans. The pictures seemed to be taken in the 1930's. So I imagine that the origins of the suit ornamentation was from the Native American tradition, not some Bund bathing club. Bob Lembke

Taurus454' date='27 May 2010 - 23:02 ' timestamp='1275015740' post='407515'] I have a Soldbuch from a Flammenwerfer company soldier. I don't recall specifics about him but will copy it and post it if there is interest. It is pretty cool! Please do. I have built a database of Flamm=Pioniere from Garde=Reserve=Pionier=Regiment (Flammenwerfer) , and it now has data on about 1200 men. I would fold your guy into it and post if I have anything else on the soldier from the data-base or other materials. Haven't seen a Soldbuch, but I have two Militaer=Paesse from the flame regiment, my father's, and a copy of one sent to me by a kind collector. Bob Lembke

This situation is awful. I have not been active on e-Bay lately, but here are my scores. Often in German purchases a cash purchase makes sense. It costs Germans $12 or more to cash a US check, they wire money about for free, and many dealers don't take credit cards. My bank wants a $40 fee to wire $12 to Germany. (Some German dealers only want to use registered service, the naive dears.) I have in the last several years sent small amounts of cash to Germany in envelopes, in double envelopes, securely sealed, but very ordinary looking, and of 80-90 mailings of cash by ordinary post every last one got through. Four times I sent larger amounts by registered mail, and two out of four got through. (I believe it is now illegal to send money out of the country in registered mail, to protect us from terrorism. If only terrorists were that dumb!) The statistics of this are clear, there certainly is something going on. Going the other way, I have lost important material in registered mail. Also, I just received a book so rare that the Library of Congress, the world's largest library, does not have it. (My grand-father was one of the many authors.) Out of 110,000,000 books offered on abebooks, there were two copies, this one, the cheapest, and in better condition, was about $300 with postage. (The other one was much more expensive.) After almost 3 months I was in despair, but then it arrived, and from notations on the package it sat at my local post office for six weeks before they decided to deliver it. the customs statement indicated its value, and perhaps someone was figuring out how to get it out of the post office. The book is enormous, oversized and 1510 pages, and weighs about 10 lbs, otherwise I may never have gotten it. A research partner has recently lost five registered letters from Europe, with extremely expensive photos in them. He is going to try to start a fire over this, but I am pessamistic, although the effort is laudable. Years ago the registered mail was sacred, and extremely secure. Diamond merchants used it regularily for packets of diamonds. About 25 years ago I had a Roman coin worth about $500 sent to me at work, at a big corporation, and it was stolen in my company's mailroom. The workers signed for it and then stole it. Amazing! But I filed a loss report with the post office and they promptly paid me $500, although the recepient had signed for it. Now registered mail is only a target. When I have reported a loss of this sort recently if it is in writing there is no response and if in person the postal employees look at you as if you were crazy. In 1968 Congress decided for public safety every gun sent through the mails had to have a large stamp on it saying: "Attention Postmaster! Gun enclosed." (for example, someone might be mailing a gun to the manufacturer for re-bluing.) In six months postal workers stole 8000 handguns out of the mail, before the requirement was dropped. I heard at that time that 67% of the postal workers had a criminal record. My mailman, very good and reliable and a long-term employee, says that the material is being stolen within the service. I and a couple of friends may start collecting material in Germany, at a friend or relative, and then every few months have a package sent via DHL or some other private service. This is a sorry mess indeed. Bob Lembke