How many REAL Gestapo Disks are out there.

[VIPER]

Does anyone think it would be helpfull too compile a thread with known Origional Discs, their numbers and locations by state/country. Mine is number 5521. In NC USA.

[JoeW]

I have tried to keep one for the past decade or two. I have yours recorded and the connection to Don. I don't think publicizing the info would be beneficial. I am always open to assisting other collectors. The list is quite beneficial.

[SMV]

"How many REAL Gestapo Disks are out there."

I can appreciate Joe's opinion about publicizing a list, however I am curious about Viper's original question. Is there a rough estimate or guestimate of how many Gestapo Dienstmarke possibly survived the war?

[Don Bible]

For a good part of the past twenty years I have attempted to locate and record as many original Gestapo warrant discs as I could learn about anywhere in the world. I have owned twenty-two original examples and have examined in hand, about twice that many more for others.

I have seen scans or high quality photographs of several others which it was not possible or practical to hand examine, but which I believed to be original. I did not record those as originals, but kept a separate record of them for my own use.

When one considers the fact that almost sixty-four years after the German capitulation in 1945, that only this many have been reported, I think one can safely say that the number of surviving original Gestapo discs can be numbered in the hundreds....not thousands. Of course this is only one person's opinion.

Over that entire span of time, I have only seen or heard of two surviving matching sets of Gestapo warrant disc and ID card. If other examples are known by anyone on this forum, I would greatly appreciate hearing about it...or them.

I have made the acquaintance of the sons of two men who carried Gestapo discs in their line of duty. I owned both of those discs at one time and still own one of them.

I have only bought one Gestapo disc directly from the Allied soldier who captured it from the owner, but I examined one other disc that was owned by the soldier who removed it from the dead body of a German officer in the Po River Valley of Italy in the last days of the war. He would not consider selling the disc, which I could certainly understand.

[JoeW]

That being written, the Gemeinde Kriminalpolizei dienstmarke is of much greater rarity. But it doesn't say Gestapo.

[Don Bible]

I fully agree with Joe's comment about the rarity of the Gemeinde Kripo disc. For many years I don't think any of us knew the extreme rarity of that disc, but it is certainly known now.

That fact was driven home for me at the recent SOS. The only example of a Gemeinde Kriminalpolizei disc I have seen for sale in a good while was priced to me for $8000. I haven't seen many Gestapo discs sell for an equal amount.

[SMV]

Don, thank you for your rather detailed analysis on the possible numbers of Gestapo Dienstmarke, and with your estimate being a little over 60 originals, I would agree that the numbers must be in the very low hundred(s). That is unless some unknown cache was to surface like the horde of Sachsenhausen Wehrpass' did in the 1990's. I think far more members went on to respectable careers in the post-war Kriminalpolizei than most realize and perhaps more discs will surface as the years go by.


I recently rented the German film "Sophie Scholl" about the underground student protesters in Muenchen called the "White Rose" I thought the film was quite well done and the portrayal of the Gestapo Agent Mohr in particular, seemed right on track and not exaggerated. Mohr's son speaks in an interview on the DVD and says that his father came through the war "unscathed" I got the impression that Mohr did little if any prison time after the war. Perhaps this was due to his attempted leniency with Frauline Scholl, I don't know. Do you know if Agent Mohr's Dienstmarke or Dienstausweis survived the war? I highly recommend the film to those who've not yet seen it.

Even with the greater rarity Joe, something tells me that you could show us an example of the Gemeinde Kriminalpolizei Dienstmarke...... if you so desired....... you lucky puppy

Rgds,

Marcus

[SiPo]

Hi Marcus,

There are currently only 26 Gestapo Dienstausweis known to exist in private collections and Government archives/museums worldwide, and unfortunately Mohr's ID has not yet appeared on the radar.

However, it is possible that the Dienstausweis and Dienstmarke are still privately owned by his family.

Regards,
Graham

[Don Bible]

Marcus, you are correct that German Staatliche Kripo officers as well as at least one Gestapo officer known to me, went back to respected and successful careers in the post war German police system.

German police inspector Herbert Kolander, who had served as a Polizei-Inspektor with the Ordnungspolizei in Perleberg was transferred to Gestapo duty in Prague on June 1, 1938, and was captured by the Americans near Pilsen in the Gestapo exodus from Prague in May of 1945. He was turned over to the British and ended up in the SS internment camp at Sandbostel in the British zone where he was held until December, 1947 before being released.

In 1949, he was exonerated and papers given to him to that effect. German police official Gustav Kufert learned of his whereabouts doing manual labor in the north of Germany, and gave him a positive declaration for a police duty. In 1951 Herbert Kolander was employed as a police inspector at the Landeskriminalamt NW in Duesseldorf, where he served with distinction until he retired in 1962 as Regional Police Director.

His son told me the story of the life of the family in Prague and the post-war years, after I was able to locate him from his father's police file in the Berlin Document Center archives. I had obtained his father's Gestapo warrant disc in Prague, and spent several months trying to locate a family member.

His son told me the ntire story and generously allowed me to have it published in two installments in the British military collector's magazine, THE ARMOURER. It was published with several pictures given to me by the son of Herbert Kolander, in issue 84, Nov/Dec 2007, and issue 85 in Jan/Feb 2008.

A picture of the Gestapo disc of Herbert Kolander is attached here. It was kept in a Czech family for over sixty years.

[Don Bible]

Kolander Gestapo disc

Reverse side of Kolander Gestapo disc.

[Don Bible]

Matching Gestapo sets

Here are examples of two matching sets of Gestapo Dienstausweis and Dienstmarke, along with a like set for the State Kripo.

[Don Bible]

Gemeinde Kripo

Here is an example of the rare warrant disc for the GEMEINDEKRIPO. In my experience it is far harder to find than the Gestapo warrant. disc.

[Don Bible]

Gemeinde Kripo reverse side

I have owned only a few of these and examined a few others for other collectors, over a period of many years.

[Dave C.]

Don, you've probably heard it many times before, although that is some amazing material you posted and it's always enjoyable to read the stories behind some of these and the men that held them! Thanks for posting!

[Don Bible]

Dave,
Thank you for your kind comments. The challenge of the research behind the individual discs I have managed to find has been far more interesting and rewarding to me than the actual acquisition of the disc...although I do enjoy looking at them and recalling their stories as the years go by. That is part of growing older I guess.

This part of the hobby has allowed me to meet and talk with persons I would not have ever met under other conditions. It has also allowed me to see some things from the prespective of those who served and lived on both sides of World War II...a period in which I was a young boy but very interested because of having a number of family members in the conflict.

I sometimes wish that I had been financially independent enough to have kept all the discs and the single Gestapo card that I once sold, but then I remember how fortunate I have been to see and handle all these pieces down through the years, and it makes me glad to have placed some of it in good homes to be enjoyed by other collectors.