Simon Orchard

Priceless, judging by the writing, made by the same faker :lol:

The stamp is bad i'm afraid. The same HPA stamp was used on other documents coming from that department, like prelim RK and DKiG docs. Compare it to the examples DDD posted in this thread over on WAF Link Line up the tips of the wings with the letters and you'll see it's completely different.

Which means?

You lucky man Jan Arne, i've been looking for an invasion of Norway zerstörerkriegsabzeichen award to a torpedo boat crew member.

The writing is terrible and April '44 is really too late for a formal DKiG. Could you show a close up of the stamp?

Ok Chris, many thanks for looking. Perhaps a civvy who died of disease then.

Thanks Chris, it's quite a sad story it seems. He went out to SA in 1898, his father being a page to Queen Victoria at Windsor. Married in 1899, his son was born two months after his death but he himself only survived a year.

I recently found that a relative of mine, Clarence Augustus Orchard died at Kimberley at the end of the siege on the 16th Feb. 1900 at the age of 29. given his age and date of death i wonder if he served in one of the militias and if anyone could shed any light on his possible service and fate?

Now i'm home i can add a little more from the book 'Flyalarm, luftkrigen over Norge 1939-1945' which includes a chapter on the Condor in Norway. It states that 3./KG40 was the only remaining staffel from KG40 that remained behind in Norway from Nov.43, it continued with the armed recce flights out to Iceland and close to Greenland (which ties in with his FFS in gold). In June '44 KG40 transferred from France to Norway with 23 Fw200 going to Værnes and 28 He177 to Gardermoen (which is Oslos main airport today. The 5th Aug.44 saw 3./KG 40 dissolved followed on the 27th Oct by the rest of KG40 with the exception of the 8 staffel, being sent back to Germany for conversion to the Me262. whilst all the He177 were also transferred, all the Fw200 were left in Norway and concentrated in 8./KG40, around 30 aircraft. They were used as transport aircraft as part of the German pull out from Finland. On the 28 Dec. 44 the airfield at Våler had 28 Fw200. Over time these were transferred away from Norway and were used for example in the evacuation of Kurland, so that Transportfliegerstaffel Condor was dissolved on the 3 March '45 and only a handful Condors remained.

Gordon When it comes to the LW in Norway, i'd go with the Norwegian researchers, like Olve Dybvig, Andreas Brekken and several others. These guys are seriously good. I could ask, occasionally you can find crewmembers. Years ago an Icelandic researcher provided me with operational reports from a crew from KG40 based on an EKI document i have, so it's not impossible. If you note the stamp on the FFS in gold doc, Fliegerführer Nord (west) you can see he's clearly in North Norway in feb. 44 and as the staffel remained here, its not unreasonable to assume he did too, the june 45 doc is quite typical of post-may 45 'norwegian' documentation, though not exclusive to it of course.

Hi Gordon If you look through the various strength returns for the luftwaffe in Norway at www.luftwaffe.no you will find 3./KG 40 and it's successors. Also worth a look is the linked Nordic aviation losses site which tabulates all the LW losses in Norway\Finland. I know the owner of the site, and i know that his information is straight from original LW returns.

Ah, so that's where the group went. Been with Weitze for quite a while, i kept thinking about getting it but something else always came up. Actually, 3./KG 40 remained in Norway, at Trondheim Værnes and continued to operate the Fw-200, one of the last staffels to do so. sometime after July '44 and before Oct '44 it ceased to have that designation as airworthy aircraft and fuel restricted operations. By the end of the war it was reduced to the name of 2. aufklärungsschwarme Condor, there was also a Transport staffel Condor which i believe had most of the Norwegian condors in the final months. Judging by the small note from June '45 which lists his awards and is included in the group he clearly survived the war, but i can't quite make out the de-nazified stamp. something like Kdo d. ........ d. LW. and Stab d. .... .... gr. ??

It's a facsimile Don.

And for a lowly gefreiter this early in the war you can be sure this 'sani' really earned it. when you realise that by this time only 2 soldiers of mannschaften rank class had got the RK you can see that this guy might well have done something pretty outstanding.

Yes, i'm familiar with that site. The point is, the painting shows a man with both the 12 and 4 year long service medals and a KVKII. Are any of those present in the photos?