Luftwaffe FJ Wehrpass Group

[Simon F]

This one has recently arrived, I think this is a great little group. Karl Fellhofer who entered into service July 1942 and transferred to the 3rd Fallshirm Jg Division in February 1944.

[Simon F]

Units

[Simon F]

Promoted upto Oberjager

[Simon F]

Promotion nomination from his original unit. Although not noted elsewhere there is an entry for Para school at Dreux that it appears Karl attended and I am hoping PK can cast some light on that one.

Edited April 17, 2006 by devonrex2003

[Simon F]

Reverse

[Simon F]

The same document from his Para unit

[Simon F]

Reverse again

[Simon F]

His awards

Luft Ground combat Badge

Wound Badge in Black

The 3rd FJD Tradition Badge

My question for this one is if anybody knows why the tradition badge was entered and why so late?

[Simon F]

Battle entries

Edited April 17, 2006 by devonrex2003

[Simon F]

Loose leaf entries

[Simon F]

Entry for the wound, Flak shrapnel to the head

[Neil B]

Another interesting group-thanks for posting.

Do you collect awards also or just documents?

Neil

[Simon F]

Neil

I mostly collect and research the documents. Occasionally I look to put awards with my groups for display purposes, where time and money permits. Although I very much doubt I will find a 3 FJD tradition badge, pre or post war to add, but you can never say never!

[Simon F]

A couple more pieces

[Simon F]

Another

[Simon F]

And another

[PKeating]

Simon asked for my input but I only just saw this so hopefully it's not too late. What a wonderful Normandy group! Fallschirmj?ger-Rgt 9 was formed in January 1944 and virtually annihilated in the Falaise Gap in August 1944. Reformed, the new regiment was again wiped out in March 1945. I love the reference to combatting "terrorists" at Maubeuge on 2.9.1944 on his close combat days attestation.

Fallschirmschule 4 was set up at Dreux in 1942 but renamed Fallschirmschule 1 late in 1943, although it had nothing to do with the original Fallschirmschule 1 set up in Stendal in 1936, the Fallschirmshule 4 designation being given to a new facility at Salzwedel.

One sees tradition badges entered into paybooks sometimes. In some cases, divisions and units even made up award certificates for them. Jean-Yves Nasse has a soldbuch with a Komet entry made in 1945. This is the first 3. FJD entry I have seen although I have heard of them. Your man was probably given the badge to make the point that he was an original member of the regiment and its division and a veteran of Normandy.

Below is an original 3. FJD tradition badge. This is the horizontal pin type. The more common type - relatively speaking as these badges are very scarce - has a horizontal pin. They were worn on the side of the 1943 pattern field cap but I have one photo, taken in the Breton toen of Huelgoat on the day of Richard Schimpf's arrival in February 1944 to take command of the division, showing a divisional staff officer wearing one on the pocket of his four-pocket tunic, in the manner of the squadron badges worn by flyers.

FJR9 was stationed in and around the coastal town of Daoulas. Raised in Reims under Hauptmann Bodo G?ttsche and commanded by Major Kurt Stephani from 1.2.1944 until his death in action at Falaise on 20.8.1944 was virtually annihilated at Falaise. Major Friedrich Alpers assumed temporary command of the survivors until 3.9.1944 before handing over to Obstlt Gundolf Freiherr Schenk zu Schweinsberg in Belgium, where FJR 9 was also reformed.

Here is an extract from a chapter for a book on the Fallschirmj?ger in France which I never bothered completing after I realised the publishers were muppets. You might find it interesting to see where young Fellhofer got his Erdkampf and Verwundetenabzeichen.

The average age of the recruits was twenty-one, their morale was high and they had been expertly trained by the division?s combat veterans, under Schimpf?s attentive eye. [photos of Schimpf with FG42 and other images] By D-Day, 3. FJD had achieved full strength and all of its personnel were battle-ready but the division had only received 70% of its arms allocation and was particularly short of machine guns and anti-tank weapons. Worse yet, the motor transport pool lacked 60% of the normal complement of trucks and had insufficient fuel for the trucks that had been delivered. As for ammunition stores, there was enough for three to six operational days.

Nevertheless, the order came on June 7 1944 to move out to Normandy, to the Avranches sector at the south-western base of the Cotentin penninsula, where the division would join 352. Infanterie-Division, 275. Infanterie-Division and 17. SS-Panzergrenadier-Division G?tz von Berlichingen on the ORBAT of II. Fallschirm-Korps. Initially based near Paris under the direct control of Oberbefehlshaber West, II. Fallschirm-Korps was headquartered in the Breton town of Guingamp when the Allies landed. Moving to Normandy, the corps was placed under Heeresgruppe B, commanded by Generalfeldmarschall Rommel. Meindl also had an assault gun brigade at his disposal, Fallschirm-Sturmgesch?tz-Brigade 12.

3. FJD was directed to use all available motorised transport, enough to move about a third of the men, with the remaining two-thirds carrying out a forced march to Avranches, a distance of around 200 km. Fit soldiers could manage this in four days but only at a brutal pace. A week would be a more realistic estimate and the soldiers would still need rest before going into battle. There would also be injuries to contend with. So the division hired horse-drawn carts from local firms and farmers. Whether they left deposits or not with the owners is not recorded but at least they paid the locals something.

The motorised vanguard, a composite regiment-sized battle group under the command of the 2ic of FJR 8, Major Friedrich Alpers and consisting of combat veterans and the best of the new boys climbed into the trucks and set off through the Breton countryside, heavily armed paras sitting on the mudguards scanning the hedgerows and fields for any signs of impending partisan ambushes. The horse-drawn elements followed along slowly but surely, moving through the Avranches sector and due north and reaching the Saint-L? sector on the night of June 17-18. Kampfgruppe Alpers, under the overall command of Meindl?s II. Fallschirm-Korps, had been in defensive positions along a line running through Saint-Germain-d?Elle, Couvains and B?rigny, on the main Saint-L?-Bayeux road since June 10, flanked on their left by 352. ID and on their right by the G?tz von Berlichingen division, the general intention being to halt any Allied advances from the direction of Bayeux.

While waiting for the rest of the division to arrive, Kampfgruppe Alpers successfully repelled several Allied attacks through the farmland along both sides of the Saint-L?-Bayeux road and launched a number of counterattacks between June 14 and 17. The divisional HQ, initially established 3km north-east of the village of Torigni-sur-Vire and about 12 km south-east of Saint-L? in II. Fallschirm-Korps? sector, was hit by Allied jabos on June 18 and had to move into a new area 2km east of Cond?-sur-Vire. Once almost all of its units had arrived, 3. FJD moved into a 24 km defensive line on the north side of the Martinville Ridge, dominated by Hill 192 giving a panoramic view of the northerly approaches and enemy activity. FJR 5 held the centre, FJR 8 the right and FJR 9 the left. In reserve behind the line were a company from each battalion of the regiments in the line, reinforced by Fallschirm-Pionier-Bataillon 3.

Facing 3. FJD were the US 2nd and 29th Infantry Divisions of Task Force C, given the job of capturing Saint-L? by General Omar Bradley. The GIs had fought a grim, unrelenting battle through the Norman bocage and now found themselves slowed down by the marshy terrain around the river Vire, and by the tenacious Fallschirmj?ger of Richard Schimpf?s division and the Waffen-SS soldiers of the G?tz von Berlichingen, supported by Fallschirm-Sturmgesch?tz-Brigade 12 under Hauptmann G?nther Gersteuer.

Officially, 3. FJD?s first brush with Allied forces came on June 14th when a divisional spearhead force met tanks of the US 7th Corps on the Saint-L?-Bayeux road. Supported very effectively by Fallschirm-Sturmgesch?tz-Brigade 12, the Fallschirmj?ger inflicted heavy casualties on the Americans. However, Kampfgruppe Alpers had encountered Sherman tanks spearheading the American advance on Saint-L? in the For?t de Balleroy near B?rigny on June 10th. Some sources give the date of this first clash as June 8th but this seems unlikely.

Once the rest of the division arrived, 3. FJD was ordered into postions across the sector between the For?t de Cerisy and Caumont, just to the east of Saint-L?. This 24 km defensive line ran along the north side of the Martinville Ridge. FJR 5 held the centre, FJR 8 the right and FJR 9 the left. In reserve behind the line were a company from each battalion of the regiments in the line, reinforced by Fallschirm-Pionier-Bataillon 3. One of the highest points of the ridge in 3. FJD?s sector was given the name Hill 192.

The paras managed to hold this line against heavy armoured attacks supported by infantry for three weeks, thereby denying the Americans Saint-L?. On July 11th, the Americans began a new offensive to break through the German defensive line and take the town. The offensive opened with a devastating artillery barrage that killed many Fallschirmj?ger.

The US 29th ID encountered stiff resistance from the paras. The US 2nd ID?s 38th and 23rd Infantry Regiments tore into FJR 9?s sector, capturing the villages of Saint-Georges d?Elle and Cloville. Hill 192 was also taken at a cost of many GI?s lives but 3. FJD managed to beat the Americans back, despite very heavy losses. And thus it went on for a week, In the end, 3. FJD was forced to withdraw and American troops entered Saint-L? on July 18th.

The Battle of Saint-L? left 3. FJD counting 436 KIA, 1,513 WIA and 136 MIA, roughly 17% of the division?s strength. 3. FJD retreated towards Falaise where survivors of the division joined a II. Fallschirm-Korps rearguard under Meindl and the 2nd and 9th SS-Panzer-Divisions under the overall command of SS-Obergruppenf?hrer Hausser, the objective being to hold off encircling Allied forces, thus keeping the narrowing corridor passable as long as possible for retreating German units.

On the night of August 19th-20th, as the Falaise Pocket shrank, Meindl withdrew to defensive positions around La Londe, south of the river Dives in preparation for II. Fallschirm-Korps? breakout. During the day, II. FK?s artillery used up its ammunition bombarding the enemy while Meindl assembled his troops in some nearly woods. The plan was to abandon all heavy equipment and move out of the pocket on foot towards Hill 262, at the eastern extremity of the pocket, in single file in two groups, avoiding any contact with the enemy. Meindl would lead one of the columns, II. FK Chief-of-Staff Oberst Blauensteiner the other. There was to be no firing by any of the soldiers until they reached the relative safety of Hill 262. They were to avoid contact with the enemy.

Hausser gave Meindl his approval and added that he would be supported by the Das Reich and Hohenstaufen SS-Panzergrenadier divisions, which had already retreated east of the river Dives. Hausser would order them to move westwards to link up with II. Fallschirm-Korps. What Hausser omitted to mention was that his two divisions did not even have thirty serviceable tanks between them.

So Meindl?s paras and their army comrades huddled in the woods during the long day of August 20th, sharing the meagre rations they were carrying in their breadbags and down the front of their smocks, and waited for the signal to move. It was raining as they finally moved out at 22:30 hrs. Despite their efforts to avoid contact with the enemy, there were several firefights during the two-hour march to the Dives. Major Stephani, the commander of FJR 9, was killed. Schimpf took a bullet in the leg and had to be carried along, in great pain, by his men. Meindl personally assumed command of 3. FJD.

As dawn broke and the rain died away, Meindl observed Hill 262 through his binoculars. It was occupied by soldiers of the 1st Polish Armoured Division. 2. SS-Panzergrenadier-Division had evidently not captured the position as planned by Hausser. Some of the Fallschirmj?ger were preparing for a frontal assault on the hill when Meindl rejoined them and flatly forbade it, ordering them to skirt around Hill 262 to the north, avoiding direct confrontation.

Later on the morning of August 21st, Meindl held a meeting with Hausser in a bomb crater less than 2 km south of the hill. Hausser informed Meindl that the Das Reich was at that moment moving south and would attack the northern slopes of Hill 262 that afternoon. He asked Meindl to organise an attack from the south. By the end of the day, the main body of the 1st Polish Armoured Division was surrounded in the Hill 262 sector. While the Poles held off the German attacks, they were no longer in control of the terrain between II. Fallschirm-Korps and 2. SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Das Reich. Moreover, their ammunition stocks were low. Thousands of German soldiers took advantage of the gap in the Allied lines caused by the encirclement of the Poles to escape during the night.

Refusing to abandon his wounded, Meindl remained in the Falaise pocket. The road towards Coudehard offered the only way out but was covered by Polish artillery. Meindl gathered all available vehicles, decked them out with large Red Cross flags and split them into two columns. at 18:30 hrs on 20.8.1944, he sent the first column down the road, having ordered all other traffic to a halt for twenty minutes. To his astonishment, the Poles held their fire. Half an hour later, he sent the second column of wounded out. Once again, the Poles refrained from firing. Meindl would later recall in his memoirs that "not a shot was fired at them and I recognized, with thankfulness in my heart, the chivalrous attitude of the enemy. After the ugly scenes I had witnessed that day, the nobility of our enemies made me forget for a moment the nastiness of it all and I offered thanks in my heart in the name of the wounded."

Eugen Meindl handed over to Generalmajor Walter Wadehn on 22.08.44. 3. FJD was all but destroyed at Falaise. The remnants of the division retreated across the Seine and north-east into Belgium where 3. FJD was reformed with recruits who would fight hard at Arnhem, in the Ardennes and finally in the Ruhr pocket but who would never match the quality of the division that faced the Americans in front of Saint-L?. So ended 3. Fallschirmj?ger-Division?s time in France but many of Schimpf?s young Fallschirmj?ger would remain there forever.

Copyright ? Prosper Keating 2004/2007

PK

[Simon F]

Wow PK!! Many thanks for such an informed reply, as they say better late than never. Never more so than this case. I had forgotten about this group and the posting. I am going to read and fully digest all this great information and then break this Wehrpass back out to admire it

Many thanks again

Regards

Simon