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**Dietrich Maerz** · 03-17-2010, 09:10 AM

How would they follow the procedure in the last days of the war?

Just because the system broke down and the war was lost one cannot make up new laws and grab the authority to award the highest military order of the nation. With your reasoning Schoerner could have awarded the Golden Oakleaves with Diamonds to everybody within his staff just because Berlin was bombed and the typewriters were broken.

The brave soldiers who fought at the end do not need the phony awards which were given out by leaders that grabbed the authority just for the fun of it. It has nothing do do wether they deserved and earned it or not.

These "awards" are illegal based on the law of the Third Reich and that is just the way it is.

**deejay** · 03-17-2010, 12:20 PM

Getting back to this badge; here is one which has a close resemblance to the first one shown here which I bought in 2003 for around 80 euro's off the german ebay - and later sold as a probable early post war reproduction.
There was a mentioning that these variations were intended for use in the Bundeswehr in the 1950's which I think may very well be the case, but who knows for sure?

Attached Files

Arm shield sniper 1st grade GE WW2 01ab repro DJ.jpg (153.7 KB, 795 views)

**Reibert-Austria** · 03-18-2010, 04:46 PM

Originally posted by Dietrich Maerz View Post

Mr. Allerberger never got a Knights Cross. ...

Hi, Bud !

What make´s you so sure ?

Rgds.,

R.

BTW.:

The Grandpa of a friend of mine, (fighter-pilot), was awarded with the Knight´s-Cross in the last day´s of war in Upper-Austria, hour´s, before the Allies captured the air-field.
The document, (also the KC), never, ever, was taken over to the pilot personally and was lost ...

I met Allerberger two times and talked with him and on an other day, he was wearing a Knight´s-Cross at an remembrance-day.
I assume, it was "private purchased" KC after war, but he´d never dared to wear this decoration without legitimation !

Believe me, Sepp was a soldier with honour and not a swindler !

**Marc Garlasco** · 03-18-2010, 05:23 PM

Dietrich,
Let me get my popcorn before you reply. Thanks!

Marc

**freeman** · 03-18-2010, 05:32 PM

Gentlemen
As Dietrich has said if it was not recorded or awarded how in Gods name is it Legit.
Marc I have the popcorn on AND THE BEER .
Regards
Michael

**PAB_Collector** · 03-18-2010, 05:56 PM

Debate this all you want, the fact of the matter is that a clear swindle has taken place.

1. Bad Sniper Badge. Well known, documented reproduction. Not the first time one of these "aged/combat worn" pieces has been sold by Detlev.

2. Clearly edited, non-original photo included with the "lot".

3. Based on points 1 & 2, how could one trust in that "field made" Knights Cross? Given points 1 & 2, it is just low grade humped up EK2.

4. If the included photo showing the KC in wear (be it field made or not), is not the original unaltered period photo (which it is not!), and this is somehow being used to entice a buyer regarding the included EK2 Frankenstein, we have a big problem here.

To say something "stinks" with this so called lot, is IMO, an enormous understatement. Bottom line, Detlev knows better........buyer beware, blind faith is dangerous in those with power.

Originally posted by Reibert-Austria View Post

Believe me, Sepp was a soldier with honour and not a swindler !

Exactly........

**Dietrich Maerz** · 03-18-2010, 06:22 PM

Originally posted by Reibert-Austria View Post

What make´s you so sure ?

Knowledeg! Knowledge is power! The knowledge about the process of awardinh the highest military order of the Third Reich. To get the Knights Cross one needed to be proposed by the next superior and then the whole chain above had to agree to it. Then the whole paperwork came to the Personalabteilung and was checked again. If the award was deemd worthy a proposal on a special typewriter was created for Adolf Hitler to read through it without his glasses it and to either agree or disagree.
On 20. April, the alleged date Mr. Allenberger got the award from Fieldmarshall Schoener, the authority to bestow the Knights Cross was alone in the hands of the Fuehrer and he was alive and kicking. There is no such paperwork, proposal or any other document regarding Mr. Allenberger in the archives and that is why I am so sure!
Feldmarschall Schoerner was acting against the legal grounds of the award regulations as instituted by Adolf Hitler. Now this is not something I came up with, this can be veryfied if one studies the subject. I would assume that a Mr. Niemann has the correct literature. If not, well, ther are some good books out there ...

The Grandpa of a friend of mine, (fighter-pilot), was awarded with the Knight´s-Cross in the last day´s of war in Upper-Austria, hour´s, before the Allies captured the air-field. The document, (also the KC), never, ever, was taken over to the pilot personally and was lost ...

This is the same case and I would assume that the grandpa of your friend also did not get the Knights Cross legally. However, to verify this one would need the name since it could very well be that "in the last days of the war" one of the then authorized people granted the Knights Cross. It was never ever said that no RKs were not awarded at the end of the war.

I met Allerberger two times and talked with him and on an other day, he was wearing a Knight´s-Cross at an remembrance-day. I assume, it was "private purchased" KC after war, but he´d never dared to wear this decoration without legitimation!

It is very much possible that Mr. Allenberge himself thought that he was awarded a Knights Cross and it could even be that the one Niemann sold is the one he got that day from FM Schoerner. But that doesn't matter - he still is no Knights Cross winner. He falls in the same category as the ones that were 'awarded' the RK by Fellgiebel. Neither he nor Schoerner had the authority to award the Knights Cross. Just as much authority as you and I would have.
If he thought he got the Knights Cross, well, he could wear one with good conscience. Why that he wore on the remembrance day never made it to Niemann is a question we might need to tackle at a later point in time ....

Believe me, Sepp was a soldier with honour and not a swindler !

Nobody here, not me nor anybody else has said, implied, hinted or anything in this direction that Mr. Allenberger was a swindler or did not have any honor. I resent that notion strongly. This thread is not about Mr. Allenberger, it is about the wrongly assumed authority of Fieldmarschall Schoerner in regards to awarding the Knights Cross, the sale of an EK2 conversion coming allegedly from a (for sure extremely brave and honorable) soldier, who never legally got the award and the additional item of a presumably fake sniper badge which is not explicitly attributed in the sales text to Allenberger but the buyer assumed so out of the context.

The group was bought by a Austrian collector and is on the way back to Mr. Niemann (who took it back w/o any problems) due to the huge controversy surrounding it.

**Robin Lumsden** · 03-18-2010, 08:13 PM

Just a small detail re. the above.

On 22nd April 1945, Hitler delegated authority to Army Group commanders and equivalents to bestow the RK, DK and Honour Roll Clasp without reference to the OKW.

From that date, the RK could be awarded immediately by these local senior commanders, without reference to Hitler or any of the other higher authorities.

**Dietrich Maerz** · 03-18-2010, 08:54 PM

That is correct but only if 'bestowal" means "final approval" and not "awarding without due process'! And it is even correct that from the 3. May 1945 of the following people had the authority to final approve proposals (which - and that is very important - means that the process of proposal, processing and proposal presentation to the authorized person was still followed. It was not that the following men could just award a Knights Cross. They could give the final approval! Big difference!):

Großadmiral Dönitz
GFM Busch
Gen. Obst. Hilpert
General Boehme
General Saucken
Gen. Oberst Lindemann
GFM Kesselring
Gen. Oberst Löhr
Gen. Oberst Rendulic
GFM Schoerner

Note again: only approval! And only from 3. May until 8. May. In the very final days the whole process was extremely shattered and the distribution of authorities went back and forth and up and down. But in the case of Allenberger the date is 22. April 1945 and at that time the process was fully functionable.
There is another grey area: "awards" after the 8.May. Those are legally also not correct since regarding the rules and regulations the Knights Cross could not be awarded by or to prisoners of war. Since the whole Wehrmacht capitulated without condition on May 8, 1945, there was nobody authorized nor eligible anymore.

Dietrich

**jacquesf** · 03-19-2010, 07:46 AM

Maybe what happened was that he was was awarded a fake sniper badge and RK, because there where no more originals available. These fakes were also awarded with COA's to the recipients.

Jacques

**Nigromontanus** · 04-26-2010, 04:13 PM

The badge is a fake. I have seen a certificate of authenticity for a fake by DN. And I have heard that a person has sent in a real DKG for certificate and got a fake bad with a letter saying it is fake. Dealers do not care. They live on this stuff and do not care.

**francesco85** · 07-19-2011, 11:30 AM

to the things sold by liemann

beside that what I ve written I m not sure if it is allerbergs´s knight cross....but even when it´s fake it would be interessting who sold it eg.....

sepp allerberger also lended some weapons to the museum of the castle in salzburg....stilll nobodys knows where the stuff went.... so please be aware of buying such things....I guess no soldier would have sold anything belonging to him to somebody for money........!!!!

I m new to that forum and I don´t know where my last post went so:Hello guys !

Well I want to intodruce myself alittle bit cause I m new here on the forum and really usually have nothing to do with army and history things so far, so if you ask me detailed questions I hardly can answer...
My name is Franz, I m from Austria, and I knew Sepp Allerberger for my whole life, I was a realy close to him and if you want I can proof some things ( just on my opinion and his wife´s). I was realy realy proud of my grandfather but he hardly told me any storys about war ( he was not a big talker about that....) but after heinrih wacker published his memoirs ( he visited him very often and they talked alot and I can proof that). Further storys on questions.....
I want to tell all of you how a good and great grandfather, loving father friend comrad he was proofed by so many people ! ( if you are realy interessted in just ask in salzburg austria for sepp allerberger the carpenter...)

Beside all of that I was so angry about that i found out sepp allerbergers knights cross has been sold !!

About 10 years ago or longer the family allerberger went on a bustrip to germany to visit some comrade grave eg don´t remember mittersil or somewhere ...and all of his old comrades and friends pushed him to take the knights cross with him ( I can tell you he was very very proud of it but he never showed he always kept his head down held his right index finger tight with his left fist ....) and well there on the bus somebody stole it from him......well he was not angry about the loss of the money ( I can tell you, if I hadn´t searched on the internet for that stuff I would still beleave that these things are forbidden or reaktivation eg )
but he was so sad about that a friend or mabe an comrade took it from him 60-70 years after he got it.......

So my concern on that whole story is not in blaming somebody or suing or getting money out of that, but please, maybe I can manage it in my lifetime to get his knights cross.....if it takes money or what ever so please on every hint for how I can find out who bought it eg, I can profide ALOT of pictures and maybe someinteressting storys nowhere written down....

Sorry for my english and I hope to hear from ya guys even if everything is A long long time ago....

**fsm2009** · 07-19-2011, 04:53 PM

About 10 years ago or longer the family allerberger went on a bustrip to germany to visit some comrade grave eg don´t remember mittersil or somewhere ...and all of his old comrades and friends pushed him to take the knights cross with him ( I can tell you he was very very proud of it but he never showed he always kept his head down held his right index finger tight with his left fist ....) and well there on the bus somebody stole it from him......well he was not angry about the loss of the money ( I can tell you, if I hadn´t searched on the internet for that stuff I would still beleave that these things are forbidden or reaktivation eg )
but he was so sad about that a friend or mabe an comrade took it from him 60-70 years after he got it.......

That's terrible, Franz!

**EKman** · 07-24-2011, 02:07 PM

Greetings gents,

I've been keeping up with this thread and the friendly debate over whether or not this individual's RK was legit or not. I'm not speaking of the originality of the decoration, but the nature of the award. I'd like to weigh in on this.

First, Dietrich is 100% correct in what he says about how the system worked, when it broke down, and what that means LEGALLY for those men claiming RKs after or around certain dates.

However, I must respectfully disagree that just because a system failed due to the chaos of war, deserving individuals should not be considered RK recipients. I'm not talking about going back 66 years later and saying "Oh, this guy should have gotten one, let's award it now."

No, but there were many Wehrmacht men who certainly earned their RKs in the closing days of the war and their immediate commanders recognized and rewarded that.

Legally, it was not within the law to do so, but I think it was certainly in keeping with the spirit of the Iron Cross as it was founded. One of the great strengths of the German military has traditionally been the initiative taken by "the man on the scene" to do what needed doing even when he might not have had the legal authority to do it.

Certainly, there was a process involved in simply becoming a German soldier. In the closing days of the war, many men were sucked into or volunteered to fight for their country without going through the legal process of training and so on that made a man a soldier. Would we say that technically these men are not veterans since they were never legally inducted in to the Wehrmacht? By the letter of the law, yes, we'd have to. Despite that, they are in fact vets by virtue of their individual cases.

What if some army group commander had just said "RKs all around so everyone will get a morale boost!" Well, as reasonable people, we'd have to take that in context and dismiss it as folly. However, I think since nothing like that happened, it is a moot point and since the RK was awarded in a reasonable and deserving fashion (if not totally legal), we can take a case by case basis as far as these muddled awards go.

Again, this is just my feeling on the matter, Dietrich is totally correct in his position, but this is a really interesting debate anyway.

Kind regards my friends,

Chris

**tomegtt** · 07-28-2011, 08:46 PM

Originally posted by HouweTrouwe View Post

office 2010,How would they follow the procedure in the last days of the war? Typewriters were changed with weapons and munition, everyone had to fight. If an officer recommendatedOffice 2007, a soldier and asked the unit CO for the awarding and he accepted it, the soldier was awarded it. I heared from many soldiers of 'unofficial' awardings. Thought they earned, recieved and deserved it as to quote these veterans. Why would decline them as official bearers? microsoft office professional,Let's not forget that Berlin was bombed and many of the archives went lost or those who could confirm any of the cases (some are now solved).

thanks ,it's right.

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Josef 'Sepp' Allerberger... Sniper Badge(Niemann).

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