A Fallschirmjäger after the war

[o.r.k.]

Thanks for sharing. Handsome couple. The pictures are so telling about the times and circumstances. Luckily good fortunes prevailed. I would Interpret the silence, as in my family as well, differently., How many children grew up fatherless (of course not postwar kids). The silence the sadness after unbearable strain and horror, often added to cruel captivity for the men was like a depression passed on without intent to the next generation. Many sought relief in work and career ....it was a collective trauma.

[naxos]

Matthias, Michael and o.r.k., your insightful comments truly add to the intent of this thread. Thanks!

1947, Black Forest - Camping with friends.

Note the repurposed tent

[lgdsjmi]

it's just awesome and moving!
thanks for sharing
JM

[Lenny W]

Hardy fantastic

[ACER]

Amazing history, dont you keep all his material?, uniform, helmet, etc?
Thanks for showing them!
Cheers.

[PanzerElite]

i bumped up your honoring father thread,
from last pages, i found you already still have his belongings
as well as his soldbuch, that is amazing !
keep it well by you and your family forever !
and now i realize to know why you have good backgroud with FJ !
i think i will have so many to learn from you, and i know so many i will never learn it to my own.

[gwatty]

Naxos, I missed this thread when it was first posted, Great I picked it up this time. Great story. I also have the documents of a FJ who served under Burkhardt and Ramcke in Afrika. He was captured in the area of Fuka on the 5 November 1942 and spared years of the horrors the later war produced. On one day their paths crossed hours apart, one escaped and one captured.

Your fathers story including escape from El Alamein, service in Russia, and Italy are incredible feats of survival. Regards graeme

[wehl]

Great story, thank you for sharing! I really enjoy reading about the history of individual soldiers, both war and postwar. It often wonder what these men actually thought about their time in the forces after their return home.

The fact that your father was a "quiet man when it came to the war", as you mentioned in the other thread, is symptomatic for the German post-war society. Unless amongst former comrades, the time between 1933 and 1945 was not really mentioned. My father, born in 1944 and son of a former Flak-Unteroffizier, told me he didn´t even know his father had been in the military until he found a few pictures showing his father wearing a uniform. The war was never brought up at dinner, and even when my father confronted his father with the pictures he only lost a few words about his time in the Luftwaffe. I guess lots of veterans felt ashamed that they fought for a wrong and evil cause... unless they had the "time of their life" during the war, such as soldiers like Oberst Rudel.

Best,


Matthias

i dont know if you are from east or west Germany ,but i talked yeasterday with a son of WH offizier which ended in DDR post war ,he told me the only fact hes father told him abaut the war was the air attack on Dresden in 1945 he was able to survive in lazaret zug ,nothing more ,he asked ,but silence.