I have my doubts about the Soldbuch and award documents, which are currently being discussed in the Soldbuch/Wehrpass forum.
Who exactly did your friend acquire this grouping from? My initial reaction is one of serious concern... but perhaps I'm being overly pessimistic.
Rob
Hi Rob,
Many thanks for your help. I think he purchased it at a show in Germany and did not have any chance to ask opinions. I do not know from whom, but he can still give it back.
Even if the Soldbuch is fake it is still an amazing group. If it is a fake, someone put a lot of work into it. A "Zweitschrift" can often look like new however and especially at wars end it was better to have one for some SS units.
Even if the Soldbuch is fake it is still an amazing group. If it is a fake, someone put a lot of work into it. A "Zweitschrift" can often look like new however and especially at wars end it was better to have one for some SS units.
The feldpost numbers on both the round unit stamps and the one written on page 02 do not match up to the unit... Discussed here:
Also, notice that the handwriting of the individual filling out the Soldbuch matches almost exactly to the writing on the piece of photo album paper with the full size portrait (see post #44).
The Soldbuch, IMHO, is a fake.
The award documents might be good, but I still haven't been able to form an opinion on them one way or another (I'd want to get Simon Orchard's and Max History's opinions on these).
Right now, my guess is that someone acquired a document and photo grouping (and quite possibly the Nahkampftag sheet) and had a Soldbuch made. Notice that the bronze CCC is not entered into the Soldbuch, but "should" have been awarded prior to the silver (or at least at the same time as the silver). It's quite possible that the CCC document was missing from the group, and as a result was not entered into the Soldbuch when it was created...
It's possible that the bronze grade CCC was just never awarded, seeing as how he qualified for the silver grade and so the bronze could have just been skipped over... Not what I'd expect to see, but sure it's a possibility. This detail could be debated either way all day long and in the end, both arguments would be based purely on speculation.
What we need to focus on are the actual entries in and on the actual documents; what we can see, what we know.
I agree completely on the SB. Apart from the fp numbers compare the Bormann sigs with the one on the EKII award note.
Now i'm not an LSSAH specialist and am thus not that familiar with the Mohnke, Wisch, Dietrich, Sandig etc. sigs but both the look of the docs and ranks, units, dates fit together, as does the close combat qualifying days sheet with Schmidt signature. That makes the SB stick out like a sore thumb even more.
Markus, the silver WB you'll note is for a January '44 wound rather than '45. Ie. around the same time frame Wittmann and Co. were becoming famous.
As to skipping the bronze CCC. I don't see a problem and the clues i think are in the rest of the documents which hint at a certain amount of lag in keeping up with the paperwork. Look at the CCC days and note that they're confirmed by Schmidt who i understand was Kp. Fhr. of the 18 kp. only in '44. The Eastrfront doc also indicates a '44 award date and the silver WB has a 9 month difference in date of wounding and award.
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