Several years ago, I was lucky enough to amass a very large German Chaplain collection spaning times from 1800 to 1955. The dichotomy of the German Chaplain serving in the III Reich always fascinated me. I wanted to learn as much as I could to see what motivated these men, and what the major differences between the Catholic and Protestant faiths were.
I quit collecting Chaplain items some years ago. Ever since then I have watched other collectors make the same mistakes I did when I started out. When the dealers decided everything "rare" was worth it's weight in gold, no matter how desirable it was, I have seen chaplain's items rise in value. This rise has lead to many, many fakes, forgeries, and outright crap to come upon the market.
I want to start a post with some of my old stuff in it, plus make a photo archive of real material so novice collectors don’t get nailed by junk. I'll try to add all the design, piping, and references I can. If the Moderators deem this post to be better used in a different venue, please let me know. If other collectors have photos to add, please do.
The German Chaplains were given the standard rank of "Officer" during both the Imperial and III Reich timeframe. The uniforms you will see should be of officer quality as will the overseas caps and equipment. Chaplains did, during WWII use enlisted men's tunics, just as regular line officers did. However, during Imperial times, I have yet to see an officer wearing an enlisted tunic.
During the start of WWII, there were roughly 450 Catholic chaplains in the German army. If you add in a roughly equal number of Protestant chaplains, you get roughly 900 service active chaplains in the German army at the start of hostilities. Chaplain assignments ran the gambit of hospital staff positions, to regimental assignments. Many German post war books detail a unnamed chaplain’s duties or heroism; many others mention they never saw or heard of a chaplain in service during the war. It appears not each regiment had a chaplain, nor did each division.
The photo below shows a chaplain ensable from the German Chaplain's Museum (?) in Berlin. A fully named grouping to a Catholic chaplain--how so:
1. The cross has the corpus, or Christ's body on it. The Evangelistic ones do not. (otherwise the uniforms are the same). Both visors in the display have METAL crosses. Read that again....METAL CROSSES. Bullion ones existed on crushers, but I have only seen ONE photo of a chaplain wearing a bullion visor cross. ONE...
I quit collecting Chaplain items some years ago. Ever since then I have watched other collectors make the same mistakes I did when I started out. When the dealers decided everything "rare" was worth it's weight in gold, no matter how desirable it was, I have seen chaplain's items rise in value. This rise has lead to many, many fakes, forgeries, and outright crap to come upon the market.
I want to start a post with some of my old stuff in it, plus make a photo archive of real material so novice collectors don’t get nailed by junk. I'll try to add all the design, piping, and references I can. If the Moderators deem this post to be better used in a different venue, please let me know. If other collectors have photos to add, please do.
The German Chaplains were given the standard rank of "Officer" during both the Imperial and III Reich timeframe. The uniforms you will see should be of officer quality as will the overseas caps and equipment. Chaplains did, during WWII use enlisted men's tunics, just as regular line officers did. However, during Imperial times, I have yet to see an officer wearing an enlisted tunic.
During the start of WWII, there were roughly 450 Catholic chaplains in the German army. If you add in a roughly equal number of Protestant chaplains, you get roughly 900 service active chaplains in the German army at the start of hostilities. Chaplain assignments ran the gambit of hospital staff positions, to regimental assignments. Many German post war books detail a unnamed chaplain’s duties or heroism; many others mention they never saw or heard of a chaplain in service during the war. It appears not each regiment had a chaplain, nor did each division.
The photo below shows a chaplain ensable from the German Chaplain's Museum (?) in Berlin. A fully named grouping to a Catholic chaplain--how so:
1. The cross has the corpus, or Christ's body on it. The Evangelistic ones do not. (otherwise the uniforms are the same). Both visors in the display have METAL crosses. Read that again....METAL CROSSES. Bullion ones existed on crushers, but I have only seen ONE photo of a chaplain wearing a bullion visor cross. ONE...
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