Stijn David

Hi John,

Thank you for the reply, i think it would be nice iff other members also could post some bravery groupings and give the story why certain awards where rendered.

I will see what i can do in the future to get a few other glider bravery story's out.

Offcoarse it does not have to be glider, other Luftwaffe is just as interesting.

Cordial greetings,

About 6 months after his mission he was also awarded the iron cross 1 e class for the crete operation !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How was this possible?

Since the mission he had to cary out was such a complete succes and he was one of the very few that landed directly near the objective + made it possible to capture the bridge undamaged. In ths first fase of the action he was actually the key person .

But why was the award rendered so late ? apparently the administrative way untill the succes was recognized as such took quite some time and this does make the time difference.

ANd here we do see the result of a late recognition, 2 bravery awards where rendered for both the same action with 6 months difference !!!!!!!!!

Cordial greetings and thanks for looking and reading.

Hello,

And here we do have our proud new awardee with the EK 2 attached towards his uniform.

But it did not end here offcoarse ....

Hello,

About 2 months later (after a well deserved holliday) he received the iron cross 2 nd. class.

Here we have the award document.

More to follow. ...

Hello,

Here is a documented (and straight from the owner into the collection) story of a Glider pilot who was active in the battle of crete.

He did earn 2 bravery awards for his action, here the story go's.

The original recipient was drafter in the Luftwaffe on 01.10.1939 and was trained to become a glider pilot. His first military training as such he received at the glider school of Braunschweig/Waggum.

After having completed the glider training he was transferred towards the 5 e Staffel L.L.G 1 (based at Halberstadt)

here he received further training and was commanded towards a Uffz. training course at Harzgerode. This training course was a very hard school and from the 60 persons who participated 3 died during the course !!!! (as a result the commanding officer was degradated from oberleutnant towards Feldwebel => he died during the Crete campaign)

Our glider pilot was on the list to take part in operation "Mercure" and went with his unit on 13.05.1941 towards Greece.

He was known as a excellent glider pilot (he has the highest glider degree for that time => the silver C) and was on the active list to fly with the first wave (as a part of the Gruppe West)

He started on 5.40 hours at Megara in the " Erste Kette " als Left " Kettenhund " from Lt. Pongratz.

His crew that he did transport : 9 soldiers from the Zug Oberleutnant Sch?chter.

And now towards his actual combat report :

" From about 10 km. at 1200 meters hight i did start my mission, My object was covered with very strong smoke and dusk clouds (from bombardments, etc .. )

I did land directly near the bridge (my glider was number 16) over the Travonitis river. The machine was quite a bit damaged but the crew did stay unharmed and fully operational.

A few seconds after the landing the DFS230 was covered very strongly with machine gun fire and did start to burn.

Our grouping did cary out its mission (capture and hold the bridge) but was under heavy fire. We had to take cover at the side of the bridge and managed to place our 2 heavy machine guns at each side of the bridge to secure the objective.

After the Tank attack (?) at about 18.00 Hours i did receive the order from a Oberleutnant (name unknown) to guard 12 prisonners and bring them towards a gathering point for POW's.

Once arrived there i did receive another order to guard the prisonners (a total of 50) during the night from the 20 may towards 21 may 1941.

At 21 May i did receive once again a new order to bring the POW's towards the Maleme airfield, wich was under heavy Artillery fire.

The POW's had to work and fill the bomb damages in order to make the airfield usable again at some point.

From 22 towards 24 May all remaining (read surviving) glider pilots where placed under the command of a Kriegsmarine Officer and used as coast guards near the maleme airfield.

At 24 May we where transported out of Crete towards Megara again"

Here we do see a picture from his fotoalbum from his glider, very close near the bridge.

Hello,

Strange guys those Belgians => it is strange IMHo to change a medal towards a cross? What could have been the reason for that ? Certainly strange if we are taking into account that there where a mere 18 years that went by before the design suddenly changed (We will probably never know )

I have honoustly no idea what the abbrevation does stand for ? Mayby one of the other forum friends?

Cordial greetings,

the unit emblem

Hello,

Here we have a unit that was situated earlyer into the Russian campaign WWII. Namely the so called LS Kdo. Hundenborn.

The abbrevation does stand for:

LS : Lastensegler (=Glider plane)

Kdo : Kommando (= Command or Unit)

Hundenborn : Name of the Officer who first commanded this small unit (he was a Oberleutnant and was replaced halfway the mission by a officer named Sanneck - Hundenborn should have been a Transporter officer but all traces go dead on him after this unit)

This Kdo was active in Russia from august 1941 towards the end of 1941. It consisted out of 15 glider planes (Type DFS230) and 25 glider pilots where attached towards this (quite a few where also involved earlyer in the Crete campaign in some way).

They first where transported by train towards Bukarest (Rumania) from where they did fly towards Targsorul (near Ploesti). From Targsorul real supply missions where flewn, first towards Tiraspol (a Dnjestr) and later on towards Nikolajew (a Bug). They did fly supply's as Fuel, Ammo, etc ... towards the troops and did bring back wounded.

Losses (of material) where also encountered as it happened from time to time that the towing plane was shot out of the air and also the DFS230 planes did receive large damage due to this. As far as i am aware no personel losses where taken itno account.

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

Thank you => so a soldier who had these profiencystripes on his arm did receive later on a lanyard as according new regulations.

In the grooping there are indeed pictures with the cord etc ..

Fun fun

Greetz,

Hi,

For me this medal is one of the more artfull and beautiful ones that where ever created in Belgium.

As found on the website of Hendrik (http://users.skynet.be/hendrik/) the medal was already instituted in 1918, to be exact on 18 october 1918.

Interesting to note is that also allied soldiers where eligible for this one.

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

Thank you both fine gentlemen for the info. Much appreciated.

I never heard of that system before.

For what do these stripes stand then exactly? Are they related towards certain training, years of service?

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

Hereby i wisch to present a very nice Belgian WWI era medal, namely the so called "Ijzer Medal".

I did get this one from our forumfriend, Hendrik => a big thanks

Feel free to post your guys issue in this thread.

Cordial greetings and thank you,

Hello,

As i do know that my dear friend Francois (and others offcoarse) has a keen interest in Luftwaffe unit emblems here is a nice picture from my personal collection to make him happy.

The shown unit weapon is that from the : Schleppgruppe 2

Both glider pilots pictured here are still amongst us today and both where involved in the battle of Cholm

Mayby not a bad idea to attach more pictures from other glider related unit symbols?, wherever possible i will name you what unit it depicts.

Cordial greetings

Hello,

Here is a scan from a rather strange uniform.

This person was later on a glider pilot and got KIA late 1943 in Russia. Here we do see him in prewar years (i assume) in a uniform but with strange striping on his arm?

Anyone ever seen this before in German military?, what is the meaning of these?

Thank you in advance,

A very good question, Stijn.

Due to reasons of, perhaps, security, I can understand the lack of catalogues depicting Wartime pieces (Glider Pilot's Badge-1940), but with the obvious competition that went on during the pre-war period, you would think that there would be more company catalogues out there. If "Assmann", why not "Juncker"?

Hi John,

Indeed a interesting topic, the catalogue should be from the periode between the end of 1940 (glider badge was only officially instituted december 1940) untill the end of teh war.

Iff such catalogue's do exist it would be very nice to see iff the glider badge was pictured. My hope is near zero bt one does never know offocarse.

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

I can only concur with what has been said so far. The pricing has virtually exploded in the past few years.

For me it has become quite above my level of understanding that persons (collectors or dealers) are willing to spend over a few hundred US $ or even Euro (?) for simple awards as the EK 2, IAB, etc ....

That is for certain a tempo that will make the market explode and then the investor collectors will go out crying that they lost lots of money, etc ....

Here we have reached the point we should reach => collect because it is fun and because you love the item for what it is and what it does stand for (honour, bravery in the field, merit for logistics, qualification, etc ...) . The money is a important point but when collecting does only turn arround the $$$ involved then you will get a serious headache in the future.

I for one have began specializing in the past few years and that has paid off, offcoarse it is a field that does not attract much interest . Namely German glider pilots. Most of the persons that are into Luftwaffe doesn't even recognize these things as they are always looking for the either Paratrooper or fighter pilots, that is a lucky thing => as then ic an pick up cherry's that are not recognized as such

The simple workhorses (=transporters as well as other branches) are often overlooked and then you get your chance. But learn, learn untill you do feel comfortable with a certain field. There are unexplored fields that needs to be redicovered (as that is what it is, REDISCOVERY of history).

Please do not collect for the value that these things are supposed to have, collect them for the history and because you like them.

As for pricing i have seen just today anotehr rather ridiculous kind of pricing, a person does find some awards => nice and original things for sure. Then he asks about what he could get for them. Some persons do tell him the correct todays market price and then some idiot does say start much higher, you can always come off from your price ???? EHHHH?? I even wonder iff these persons do realize how crazy this is getting (well let the dumb ones then eat each other for those to expensive things, not my kind of collecting.)

It would not suprise me that in some kind of future when i have reached my saturationpoint (= that is when i will no longer be able to contact and chat with glider pilots who are still amongst us at this day) that i also do stumble into imperial.

Anyway => the prices are indeed become insane

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

Is there anyone who has ever seen a catalogue from one of the company's who produced our beloved badges and awards with a glider pilots badge shown?

Iff so would you be so kind to show it here?

Cordial greetings,

Hello gordon,

Thank you for showing that very nice and rare award document. That is one that really is not all that common.

I see also with large interest that his deeds to be named in the "Ehrenblatt" does name, Ssinjawino.

This place was the heavy fought for hillside in the Northern part of Russia and on the date of 22.07.1943 the battle now known as " Third Ladoga - battle" started. It was exactly the purpose of the Russians to pierce towards Mga and when possible catch the so called "Ssinjawinno" hights. (This was the task of the 67 Russian Army - commander: GM Duchanow).

The German 11 Infantery Division (ID) managed to hold the Russian Offensive off at the Ssinjawinno hights and they handed tehse hights over towards the German 21 ID on the date of 11.08.1943.

So this person did win his award for his participation on the succesfull defence of the SSinjawinno hights during the 3 th Ladoga Battle.

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

For all persons who have a interest in trhe Cholmshield => check out the following:

http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=9942

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

Indeed no visible crater => howver iff we look close to the picture of the Go we can see earth lying upon the aircraft etc ... (wingpart, body of the plane) and also some uneven places on the ground.

It depends offcoarse on wich type of bomb did hit these planes. Obvious the power of destruction was good enough to disable the Go 242.

About the Ju, is it possible that it would have been replaced from the original place where it was hit by something (or came in to hard) to scrap it?

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

=> a few fine answes for sure, hehe

I think however that the damage is to be sought in a bomb attack, here is a picture from the very same airfield. This Go 242 was obviously hit by a bomb of some sort.

I think that the Ju 87 was hit in a same way, but that picture is probably neater due to the fact that they cleaned up already a few things and did start in removing usable parts for reuse.

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

1)

I have also found trace that confirms the following stated:

" That's interesting. Do you know how many children he had? I ask because I got the following story from a relative whose father was also in the Kurland army: Just before the surrender, a local commander in Kurland decided to let all those with three or more children board their last intact ship and sail across the Baltic sea to Holstein, where they surrendered to the British - and got home quite soon. "

The found info does state " Ein Anruf vom Gefechtsstand gab Befehl, dass etwa 15 bis 20 Mann des Bataillons (bew?hrte K?mpfer und Kinderreiche) per LKW nach grobin sollten, um von dort mit dem Flugzeug in die Heimat transportiert zu werden "

There should have left 35 Ju's to transport personel from Kurland towards Norway, about 3 did reach the destination in good order, all otehrs where shot down (nothing known iff there where survivors.)

So there is a slight possibility that he left Kurland through plane (however very small)

2) The second possibility is that he left kurland through boat, as about 140 German soldiers left from the port of Libau in the ship "Ziebens" towards Sweden. They managed to reach sweden on the date of 9 Mai 1945 with much luck.

Once landed they where placed as "Milit?rinternierte" for about 7 months. Then they where traded towards Russia and became also in Russian captivity.

So this is also not really a option, as he wa sonly evry short it seems in captivity.

Then we have a final possibility

3) It is also known that after the 8 may 1945 the majority of the troops where first placed in a POW camp, the after a few weeks the following Germans where released : persons from Luxemburg, Silesia, Elsass (France) , other area's. towards the Britisch zone.

So mayby he was amongst one of these ?

Anyway we will probably never know for certain, but it does give a nice aray of possibility's that are no invention but truth. So once in a while persons did get out of captivity for various reasons.

Cordial greetings + thanks for reading,

Hello,

Here is one that did came in today in a glider officer grouping. This Ju 87 sure had better times => i just wonder what happened with it? hit by a bomb from very nearby ? hit from anotehr plane?

The picture was taken at Lemberg - july 1943.

Has anyone similar pictures from german aircrafts with strange damage?

Cordial greetings + thanks for looking,

Hello,

I have found the answers towards a few questions i still ahd on the entry's etc ...

@ Poland => the battle entry is : Nowogrod (the 21 ID was indeed active in that area)

I also could decipher the following signatures

A) first signature

R?bener Hans

Hauptmann

II./Grenadier-Regiment 407

He did win on 05.11.44 the Honour Roll clasp

Apparently during the time of sigining he was still a Oberleutnant.

B) Second signature

Heyer Karl

Stabsfeldwebel

13./Grenadier-Regiment 407

He did also win the honour roll clasp on the date of: 07.05.43

He did make it towards Leutnant at the end of the war.

Cordial greetings,

Hello,

His rank whil in this picture is Major, he went on to become a Oberst

Cordial greetings,