ostprussenmann_new

Ost

First off I would like to thank you for your reply to my thread, yes many armor units trained south east California. The tradition is still the same at the NTC National Training Center in the Mojave Desert many of our Armored Units spend at least one month training 2 weeks in the Sand Box. I remember after training the units would do a field loss for all the rucksacks full of TA-50/Gear that fell of our M1 Tanks in the late 1990's. I would love to see some of the artifacts that you found out there would go great with this thread.

Thank you

Lorenzo

Hi without a doubt done and seen in many photos, but proportionally, in the days of tunics with buttons just about everyone was wearing them in the buttonhole... later photos with the Bluse and its hidden buttons there are guys who sew them on where the buttonhole should be, but there are many more with the ribbon on the chest.

I think it was just a question of praticality at that stage.

Best

Chris

If you look at my posting about Prussian Infantry Regiment Nr. 18 (von Grolman), there is a picture of my Great Great Uncle in a hidden button blouse with his EKII sewn onto the tunic.

ostprussenmann

General Patton Memorial Museum

Lorenzo

I never made it here, but I have a great story. When I was 15, I visited my father in Hemet, CA. We went drove out to the desert near the muesum. My father and took his jeep out to go four wheeling. I found some rusted out vehicle hulks. I also found a 20mm bullet, links, and shell-casing. The casing was marked 1944 along the rim. I ended up finding a whole bag of stuff from WWII that showed up in the desert from the California Desert Maneuvers. Supposedly, Gen Patton trained out there prior to his landing in Africa. I will see if I can find any old pictures and the other stuff that I found. My father found a rusted out helmet. I would eventually love to see the muesum.

ostprussenmann

True, but in many cases they sewed the ribbons right where the button hole would have been anyway.

Chip

This is agood question. I have alway's wondered this about the EKII myself

Jason

The Füsiler-Regiment Nr. 34 Leutnant was Kurt Hohenberg. I have come across no officer of the name of Manfred von Hohenberg either regular or reserve in LGR. 109. He is not listed in the Offizier-Stammliste published in 1925 or the officers's association list dated 1936.

There were regular officers in the regiment named Freiherren von Meyern-Hohenberg of which only Gustav-Erich was a prewar regular of the right age group. He however was a Fahnenjunker and not an einjährig-Freiwilliger.

There is, of course the possibility that the owner of your tunic was never commissioned.

Regards

Glenn

Glenn

I am going to have to agree with you. Maybe he just served one year and was out. Thanks. There are some other officers that I would like to look up too from either regiment. Are there any electronic copies out there of Baden Rangliste or Officer Associations? Thanks everyone for the help.

Jason

oh he is fine! I just got a box of books from him yesterday. He is luxuriating in a snow free yard after being trapped behind acres of snow for months.

I think IR 109 may have a regimental history on googlebooks. It rings a bell.

I have the Regimental History of RIR 109, just nothing on the Leib-Grenadier 109 Regiment. I did not find a Hohenberg in my book. It is really frustrating when you have the name of something, like all of us have had, and can't go any further.

Ostprussenmann

I have 1909 and 1914 (officers only)

Thanks Hardy. I think Rich Research has some, but he has not been on here for a while. I hope that he is ok.

Does anyone have one out there for Baden Units. If not, does anyone have a list out there for all soldiers and officers in Baden Leib Grenadier 109 Regiment?

ostprussenmann

Jens

Interesting document indeed. Do you have anything else of the awardee?

ostprussenmann

Gents

Has anyone read Russel Weigley's Age of Battles? I just finished reading it. His main thesis is that war is futile and there is no such thing as Decisive Battle. Does anyone have anything out there (primary source documents with translations to English) that tells of decisive battles being won? I would love to read them. I did find one on here that someone posted about the 5th Cavalry Cursaiers---spelling off.

Thanks

ostprussenmann

Timo, absolutely fine and scarce with the original ribbon.

Nice one!

The "R" is actually a "K" for Kachel who did cut the die.

Sascha

Didn't Kachel make Imperial War era Iron Crosses also?

ostprussenmann

I did a quick check in the Ehren Rangliste, thinking he might have become an officer during the war, but there was only one Lt.Hohenberg and there was no "von" in his name. Besides, this one was killed in the Chapitre Wald (Verdun battles of 1916).

Chip

Thanks Chip. I wonder if there is anything out there to find out. Was his name Manfred? The quick story behind the tunic is that a friend of mine is a large Baden collector of BLG 109 and RIR 109 items. He still owns the picklehaube. The tunic was given to my friend's father from a gentleman in Germany whose father was Manfred von Hohenberg. The gentleman sold the tunic to pay for soemthing else. I know the owner of the tunic is from around the Baden area. I looked up the name Hohenberg last night and the name is of Austrian nobility. I don't know anything else. My friend here in the US bought the tunic for me. I would love to find out anything about the man. I guess it may take awhile. In the Ehren Rangliste, was the gentleman that you found in Baden Leib Grenadier Regiment 109?

~Jason

Badisches Leib-Grenadier-Regiment Nr.109 (not RIR109)

Thanks HArdy for clearing it up.

I thought so. I am still happy with it. It is the closest that I can get to having an original uniform for now. It would be great to find a RIR 109 tunic. Do you have any information on the gentleman?

Jason

Another Picture of the Tunic

v/r

ostprussenmann

Gents

Today I received a very special item to my collection and my first tunic. It is a Pre-war Dunkelblau tunic of BGL 109 or RIR 109. I am thinking that it is Baden LG 109 since my book does not show his name in it. The owner's name is Manfred von Hohenberg. The buttons on the tunic have the number 8 on it meaning that this gentleman was initially in Kompanie 8 or one of the two regiments. Tunic also has some moth damage, but it's in good hands now.

Does anybody have any information on this gentleman? "von" isn in his name probably means that he is some gentleman of nobility; I am assuming. Here are some picture of the tunic that I have hanging up on my wall until I can get a stand to display it. He did survive the war.

v/r

ostprussenmann

Here is a copy of the document that I have.

The date is 28.6.1992

Here is a copy of the document that I have.

Gentlemen

Can anybody help me with some Research?

I bought a box of documents about six months ago and started going through them this weekend and found a Reunion Card for a WWII veteran. The Reunion Card was for I.SS Panzerkorps LAH. The man's name on it was Georg Lenz At the end, it stated somethng about him being awarded the Golden Honor Badge. Date was 28.6.1992.

I thought that it was complete junk until I found this link on the internet:

http://articles.latimes.com/1985-05-12/news/mn-18510_1_waffen-ss/2

He was quoted saying this: Georg Lenz, 68, a former lieutenant, said most of the veterans present had fought against the Russians in World War II.

"I crossed into Poland on Sept 1, 1939 (the day World War II started), and I fought until May 8, 1945 (when Germany surrendered)," Lenz said.

"I am very proud to have been a member . . . , grateful to have taken part in such wonderful event. These are all lies, we never carried out any massacres. We made one mistake, we should have been as cruel as people claim we were.

"All we want to do is sit down peacefully and talk about the old days, to meet buddies with whom we lay in dirt and who fought alongside each other."

I don't know much about WWII units, but since he was an officer, they may be some information on him. My computer is down right now, so I am over at a friends so I will provide pictures later. Does anyone have any information on him?

ostprussenmann

Who is the seller who is offering it? Is he offering it as genuine? It looks far too new to be genuine.

Arnim

I will say that some shady stuff is happeneing in Germany right now. I sent a medal to a man on GMIC over a month ago and it disappeared and he never received it, so I have to give him his $1300 USD back. I am quite disappointed. I have also been told that there is some fake stuff coming out of Czech, Russia, and China. It is a good warning to everyout there.

ostprussenmann

Who is the seller who is offering it? Is he offering it as genuine? It looks far too new to be genuine.

Arnim

That is what I thought. That is why I posted it on here. It was a while back now and since I have erased it from ebay. I do know the guy was posting it on ebay.de. Sorry that I could not help. If I see him again, I will post his name.

ostprussenmann

The guy who was trying to sell the ribbon bar was not "gerst." But after looking on ebay, it looked like his. I never knew that this posting would start this type of discussion, but I have learned alot from all of you. Since I have joined this forum, I have not bought anything without someone looking at it or giving their opinion. I am not as smart of this as many of you, but I think that we should be respectful to everyone's opinion. All of us have our own portions of Imperial german history that we are smart or should i say experts on, but we can all learn something. Young collectors are not stupid, but maybe a little ignorant (myself) on certain things.

Thanks

ostprussenmann,

Very nice. What's the story

That is a wide-ranging question. He was quite a personality and there is a lot of information on him. I met him a couple of times. The Wikipedia entry for him is a reasonably good place to start: http://en.wikipedia....i/Rudolf_Witzig. There is a lot of information. It depends on how much detail you need to go into. There are so many internet and book references. Do a Google search and you'll find all sorts of things: http://www.amazon.co...g/dp/1848325592

PK

I did do an internet search and have some stuff on him. Since you met him, do you have any copies of interviews or questions that you asked him? I would love to cite your interview. I have all sortrs of secondary source materials. I am looking for primary source ducumentation.

Thanks

Jason

All Concern or interested

I am doing a biographical study on him for my Masters Class. I have the Book Hitler's Paratrooper and all open source material from the internet. Does anyone have any copies of documents, diary entries that they can send to me on Rudolf Witzig. I would be willing to give out my PM email to get documents sent.

Thanks

Ostprussenmann

Website Eben Emael

10 May 1940

The execution of the German Plans.

After half a year of rigorous isolation, the order came as a liberation on the 9th of May 1940. The "Sturmabteilung" Koch went to the airfields near K?ln (Cologne). The take-off was on Friday the 10th of May at 3.30 A.M. Belgium Time (which is 4.30 AM German Time) in the darkness of the night. The landing was planned at 04.25 A.M. (Belgium Time).

The bridges of Maastricht were blown up by the Dutch Army around 7.00 AM and delayed the ground forces in that area for more then 20 hours. The bridges of Veldwezelt and Vroenhoven were taken undamaged by the men of "Stahl" and "Beton". The bridge of Kanne was blown up and the men of "Eisen" gave a rough battle with the Belgian Grenadiers who were positioned in trenches by the bridge. The Pioneer-bataillon 51 could not cross the canal to relieve the pioneers on Fort Eben-Emael. They tried to cross over in rubber dinghies but came under heavy fire from Block Canal-North ("CN").

Out of the 11 gliders planned for Eben-Emael only 9 landed on the fort. The cable of Lt. Witzig's (Commander of "Granit") glider broke near K?ln while taking an evasive action to avoid another plane. Witzig himself arranged a new take-off somewhere near the Rhine with a Ju-52 fitted with a new cable and new wheels for the glider. His glider landed at 6.30 A.M. on the fort. The other glider was detached to early and landed near D?ren (D). These men advanced with two cars to the border and forced their way to Eben-Emael.

The anti-aircraft gunnery of the fort was silenced at once and in the first 10 minutes the following bunkers or cupolas were attacked or taken:

Casemate Maastricht 1 (taken)

Casemate Maastricht 2 (taken)

Machinegun bunker MiS (taken)

Machinegun bunker MiN (taken)

Cupola North (attacked and neutralized)

Cupola South (attacked but not neutralized)

Block IV (only the observer neutralized)

Note: At first Cupola 120 was only attacked by throwing explosives in the barrels because the glider foreseen for this target landed to early in D?ren (D). Later on the Germans used a shaped charge but could not destroy the cupola. Anyway the barrels were out of use.

It was the shaped charge that caused the fast elimination of the fort's guns and bunkers and until now it was the most successful pioneer-air-raid that is known in the history of wars.

In the morning there were a few counterattacks by the Belgians, but after some firing from the Germans they disappeared rapidly. Later on the men of Granit were fired at by the artillery of the fort Pontisse (1000 grenades of 105 mm) and fort Barchon (40 grenades of 150mm). However this firing also prevented counterattacks by the Belgian infantry-men of the field-army in sector Eben-Emael.

In the Casemate Maastricht 1 and Machinegun bloc MiN the Germans set fire to shaped charges at 20 meters deep to prevent an counterattack from Belgian artillerists in the fort. They also destroyed the stairs of the machinegun bloc MiS.

Only Casemate Vis? 2 and 1 (only a few hours), Cupola South and Observer Eben 1 were active on the superstructure until the surrender the next day. These two bunkers ("Vi2" and "CpS") fired at the Canal on Lanaye (B) and Eysden (NL) because the German troops tried to cross the river and the Canal. Observer Eben 1 could give the precise positions of the Germans to the fire-control. Also active were the bunkers Canal North and Canal South which fired at the Germans who were crossing the Canal.

During the attack no poisoned gas was used! However most of the Belgian artillerists had problems with the ventilation because of the gun smoke.

The German ground troops who arrived 26 hours later as planned attacked the remaining blocks which still were firing. On top of the fort the German pioneers made at last contact and felt released. The fort surrendered on Saturday the 11th May 1940 because it could not hold any longer the pressure of the German attacks. Most of the Belgian soldiers of the fort had lost their faith to withstand this superior enemy who used new weapons and co-operated with the air force to accomplish only one goal: victory!

Do you or anyone else know where I could get copies of primary source documents for Rudolf Witzig? I am doing a reasearch paper on him for my Masters.

Thanks

Ostprussenmann