SS Standard Bearer's Bandolier.

[paulj]

Here's an SS Standard Bearer's Bandolier. I obtained a number of these circa 1990.

[oldflagswanted]

markings & condition ???

Here's an SS Standard Bearer's Bandolier. I
obtained a number of these circa 1990.

Hello paulj:
Interesting, are they all marked the same? Silver
tress seems dull, is that just the photo lighting?
I've had four SS battalion flags over the years,
but passed on picking up the trooping harness,
as I decided not to collect fahnentrager items.
OFW

[paulj]

The photo was lightened but the silver isn't extremely bright. I don't recall if all the bandoliers I had were the same RZm but I presume they were. One had the unit marked in pencil and this one has a unit ink stamp.

[Pascal Bernhard]

Hi Paul,

here with pics of mine...

[Pascal Bernhard]

[oldflagswanted]

Very nice ...

...here with pics of mine...

PB:
Very nice! Interesting that it is the same
RZM maker, and that the eagle stamp looks
like a early version, and the same on both.
Likewise, that II/16 sturmbannfahne still
exists, S22 on WAF "wmtf" thread t=427262
OFW
(below) SSB II/16, a first pattern (fringe & static swaz),
but with replaced snap hook where top ring should go. Likely
property marked by post WW2 Czech movie studio, & patch
on one side.

[Mike Davis]

Very nice! How many do you have?

[paulj]

great stamp for II/16.

I had the flag for Fussstandarte III/16 but it only had one corner patch. I sold it years ago. The SS-Nachrichtensturmbann 10 flag I have is also from Breslau as is the 11th Reiterstandarte DE. Apparently, a lot of this area's flags got to Statni Film.

Another DE Reiterstandarte I know of alledgedly came to Statni Film via Moscow. It makes sense that given the volumn of captured flags, they would have been distributed to film studios, theatres and museums.

Oddly but happily, there were lots of SS flags entering the market at the time (1989-91) through those sources. Many, if not most, seemed to be from Silesia and Sudetenland. I still have a command flag of SS Standarte 70 from Glogau, Lower Silesia.

There were also literally heaps of SS camo uniforms including helmet covers (I had several and they were size marked!), black SS jackets and visor caps, SA and NSFK caps, bags of SS shoulder straps, sundry SS sleeve insignia (some still factory tied in bundles), POA shoulder straps, etc etc etc and, of course, those famous tan helmets.

My theory on the tan helmets is that they also originated in Silesia, probably discovered still in the factory or at a distribution point. What many people don't know is that many were still wrapped in original factory paper when they turned up at fleamarkets like the one near Lidice.

Ahh, die guten alten Zeiten...

[oldflagswanted]

Moscow SS-SBF's ???

...I had the flag for Fussstandarte III/16 but it only had
one corner patch. ...a lot of this area's flags got to Statni
Film. Another DE Reiterstandarte I know of alledgedly came
to Statni Film via Moscow. ...Ahh, die guten alten Zeiten...

paulj:
Have not seen any SS-SBF's in Russian museum collections,
so wondering about just how Statni Films got their SS flags?
Or if any SS flags can be seen being used in post WW2 Statni movies?


PS/ Noted online that ...
"...at the close of WWII, the Czechoslovakia State Film (Statni Film)
company claimed thousands upon thousands of original uniforms,
hats, flags, equipment, insignia, vehicles, medals, decorations, and
other items for use in its anticipated anti-Nazi post-war propaganda
movies. Many of the surviving items were brought out of Czechoslovakia
in the last 20 years and were promptly absorbed into the collectors'
market. ...postwar addition are the film company stampings. Many
collectors consider these markings an asset, as everything taken by
Statni Film was original and fresh from the Reich."

[Pascal Bernhard]

Likely property marked by post WW2 Czech movie studio, & patch
on one side.

Do you think it's possible to have pics of this markings ?

Thanks

P.

[paulj]

I'm sure if one watched enough Statni Film movies one would see the flags. I saw an episode of a Statni Film TV mini-series (circa 1990) about a small castle in Bohemia. A group of little old pricesses are hold up there at the end of WW2. At some point, the resident grande dame tell the butler to get rid of the uniforms because the Germans are retreating and approaching the castle. The Russians must be close behind. He comes down the stairs with an armload of Imperial generals' uniforms of all types. Then the Germans arrive. They're wearing those fresh tan helmets, riding original motorcyles and Kuebelwagen, etc etc.

Many Statni Film items had a rectangular stamp with 1951. I always presumed that was the year of acquisition.

There was already a large Czech film industry before the Germans arrived in 1938. It was developed under Nazi control until 1945. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrandov_Studios

I imagine at some point it was decided that Statni Film would be developed as the Hollywood for Soviet war and other films. Considering the German presence in Czechoslovakia since 1938 as the Reichsprotektorat, the quantity of Nazi items of all sorts concentrated there would have been immense. Add the Wehrmacht bases and staging areas, then the retreating Wehrmacht, plus the Soviet occupation, by default there's everything one needs for epic film making. The Soviet forces there provided the extras. Their service uniforms were essentially the same as those worn during the war.

Because Sudetenland and Silesia, etc reverted to the Soviet sphere of influence, some captured material would have been related to those areas. Hence the large number of Silesia related SS flags and quantities of grey topped SA caps from Sudetenland, etc etc. Former German factories, POW camps for German prisoners, RZM and other shops, tailors, official buildings, barracks, etc in those areas would have had additional stocks of insignia, uniforms, helmets, regalia, field equipment, vehicles etc etc. etc.

Flags may initially have gone to the Soviet Union as traditional war trophies. There they may have been part of the Moscow Victory Parade. According to the owner of the DE SS Reiterstandarte, that piece is identified as having been included in that event. Maybe his DE standard is visible in film footage or photos from the Victory Parade. In any case, it now bears the typical stamps from Statni Film.

In the early 1990's there were caps and other items with inventory stamped from theatres in Brno and elsewhere.

One has to remember that the Soviets relocated entire factories down to the last brick back to the Soviet Union. Rather than roll over daggers and Nazi regalia with tanks, they systematically plundered and kept it for its potential value. When the Soviet Union collapsed waves of odd WW2 items came westward, like dozens of luger holsters or heaps of Panzer uniforms and caps. Obviously, word reached the curators of museums, warehouse managers etc, that the stuff had value and they were sitting on gold mines. In the euphoric Wild West that was the post-Soviet Russia, anyone with access to something that could be sold, sold it.

Statni Film was just the tip of the iceberg.

[oldflagswanted]

more about Statni Studio marked SS flags ???

[OFW]"...marked by post WW2 Czech movie studio..."
Do you think it's possible to have pics of this markings ?
Thanks
P.

P:
The SS-RS DE cited by paulj's is shown in the Ulric/Bender DE book.

...Many Statni Film items had a rectangular stamp with 1951.
I always presumed that was the year of acquisition.
...Flags may initially have gone to the Soviet Union as traditional
war trophies. There they may have been part of the Moscow
Victory Parade. According to the owner of the DE SS Reiterstandarte,
that piece is identified as having been included in that event. Maybe
his DE standard is visible in film footage or photos from the Victory
Parade. In any case, it now bears the typical stamps from Statni Film...

paulj:
Nice reply, thanks! I've reviewed the 1945 Moscow Victory
Parade film and still photos, and only the LAH DE pole shows up,
no other SS flags. Likewise, none are listed in the Moscow Museum
per WAF t=447920. Not heard of any DE's in other Russian Museums.
....

[Pascal Bernhard]

...

[paulj]

There are different versions of the Victory Parade film out there. There's one in 4 or 5 parts on Youtube and it shows a very brief segment of the flags being thrown down, including the Adolf Hitler DE (with the wrong flag...the correct one was discovered rolled in a cardboard tube by George Petersen in the museum storage facility in the early 1990's).

However, the actual flag ceremony produced a mountain of flags. There are published photos and probably more film showing, if not the entire process, at least the end result.

[oldflagswanted]

more about Moscow flags ???

There are different versions of the Victory Parade film out there.
There's one in 4 or 5 parts on Youtube and it shows a very brief
segment of the flags being thrown down, including the Adolf Hitler
DE (with the wrong flag...the correct one was discovered rolled in
a cardboard tube by George Petersen in the museum storage facility
in the early 1990's).
However, the actual flag ceremony produced a mountain of flags.
There are published photos and probably more film showing, if not
the entire process, at least the end result.

Yes, I am well aware of the various parade film versions, and
I know George Petersen too. The banner, not carried in the parade,
but attached for the before Lenin tomb ground photos, was a KM
trumpet banner. It was on display later in the Moscow Museum still
on the LAH pole (eagle,wreath,box, & banded top pole section) until
they figured out they got it wrong. Some of the ~204 German flags in
the Moscow parade were Imperial German from the Berlin Museum,
and some were even veteran flags, and a few NSDAP flags (DJ, DAF,
Orts, etc.) but no SS. Oddly there was even an Imperial Russian Christ
Icon unit flag dragged across Red Square in the 1945 Victory Parade.
OFW
(below) KM trumpet banner hung in error on SS-LAH box.