Rolf Michaelis

[Bill Hughes]

I know that this is a "blanket" type question,but would be interested in hearing opions on Rolf Michaelis works,

Would like to hear about his background, he has certainly published some interesting titles,unfortunatly my German is very basic although I know there has been a few titles published in English.

thanks in advance!

[TWS]

Old thread, but great question. Amazon just recommended one of his books "Assault Badges of the German Army in World War II" to me. I saw that he has written a number of books. The price alone made me suspect it may not be a serious reference work for the collector ($18.53) but thought I would do a search and see if any members have purchased his titles and what they think of them. I did see the negative review of his sniper book.
Thanks in advance.

[Mil-Archive]

I have several of his, he writes good introductory books on different subjects. Anti-Partisan badge, Sonderkommando /Sturmbrigade Dirlewanger but his most useful one in my experience is 'Combat Operations of the German Ordnungspolizei, 1939-1945: Polizei-Bataillone, SS-Polizei-Regimenter'.

This is a solid basic reference book, it has a lot of concise information in one place so it's often the first one checked before going from there to more in-depth books for more detail. Well written, well laid out and illustrated I'd recommend it as a good basic introduction. It is not on the same level as Stefan Klemp or Wolfgang Curilla which are the result of years of original archive research, the Michaelis one is basically rewritten what is already known from most major sources in a logical format.

He has written A LOT of books though so I can only comment on a fraction of them. There are a couple more of his I will probably pick up at some point, 'Latvians in the Ordnungspolizei/SS', 'Volksdeutsche in Orpo and SS' and also the Karstjager book.

[TWS]

^^ Thank-you sir.

[Arctic War]

He indeed writes good introductory books but that is about it IMO.

Kind regards,

AW