24th February 1944 Typewritten Feldpost 24th February 1944 Typewritten Feldpost 1/0 See 24.02.1944 - 26/15 text needs further translation Dear Sister Heydenreich. Thank you very much for your friendly letter of the 11th of this month. I was really pleased to receive a message from you after such a long break. I thought you were angry with me, but I didn't know why. I could have guessed that you had no time due to the Christmas business. May I ask you about the December sales, the round number? Not down to the last penny. People are still interested in the situation there. The fact that you moved is incredibly interesting. It was always my only concern back then, firstly, to get out of the "fly shop" and secondly, move into the city center. Now you've managed it. And it had to be done right in the middle of the Christmas business? Yes, that's how it is in the military; such things are usually carried out at the most inconvenient time. Well, the main thing is that it's more practical there, and that you like your new accommodations. Sales have improved, as you say, and the comrades don't have to travel as far as they used to. When I'm back in Paris, I'll try to come to E. for the "weekend" and look at the converted Front bookstore. Did you manage the annual inventory well? Did you miss much? So you already had to swap places with your assistant. Sister Laibl went to Blois, and from there you got a new assistant there. That's just how it is in the military; there's a constant coming and going of comrades, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. By the way, I know Blois from the advance, so from 1940. And you've been on leave there too? You're doing well there, though. I was on leave before my Nancy relief in June, and I haven't been back yet. Unfortunately, I can't leave here either because I've had to run my shop on my own since January 1st. In the middle of the Christmas season, my employee, who was provided by the local troops, was taken away from me. I opened on November 20th and, until November 30th, i.e., in ten days, I sold almost RMK 8,000. December brought in almost RMK 15,000, which I had to manage almost 90% of on my own; my employee only arrived two days before the opening and was a pastry chef in civilian life. I didn't really come to my senses for a long time. Only in January, when things had returned to normal, did things calm down. But I'm constantly busy; I sold over RMK 5,500 in January. My employee, Jendricks, is no longer a front-line bookseller. He's been replaced and is with the troops. How are things going in E;? What's actually going on? Comrade Schroth? I wrote to him at least eight weeks ago, but haven't received a reply yet. Perhaps he's not even there anymore? Unfortunately, we only saw each other at lunchtime in Paris. We arranged a time to talk in the evening, but then unfortunately didn't meet again. Please give him my best regards, as well as the "sergeant" at the field command there. And now, finally, thank you very much for the RMK 20 you sent, which you exchanged for 400 francs after I sent it to Miss Vezain. It's already worth something to me now that I have francs for it. Please also give my best regards to Miss Vezain; I also thank her very much for her efforts. And now best regards to you, Rudolf Kramer Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

14th August 1944 Stalag VIII-A 14th August 1944 Stalag VIII-A Screenshot 2021-11-27 at 09.29.50.png Screenshot 2021-11-27 at 09.29.50.png 1/1 Stalag VIII-A Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

15th April 1944 'Die bunten Hefte...' 69 15th April 1944 'Die bunten Hefte...' 69 15.04.1944 Die bunten Hefte 69 reverse.jpeg 15.04.1944 Die bunten Hefte 69 reverse.jpeg 1/1 'Die bunten hefte für unsere Soldaten', No.69 (sixth series), 'Das Märchen' by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Sent from the NSDAP office in Koblenz to a Kriegsmarine soldier at Cuxhaven (FPN 22405 L - Marine Flak Artillery Division 214). Ref: 15.04.1944 Link to a list of 'Die bunten Hefte...' publications Das Märchen The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily (German title: Märchen or Das Märchen ) is a fairy tale by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe published in 1795 in Friedrich Schiller's German magazine Die Horen (The Horae). It concludes Goethe's novella rondo Conversations of German Emigrants (1795). Das Märchen is regarded as the founding example of the genre of Kunstmärchen, or artistic fairy tale. The story revolves around the crossing and bridging of a river, which represents the divide between the outer life of the senses and the ideal aspirations of the human being. The tale begins with two will-o'-the-wisps who wake a ferryman and ask to be taken across a river. The ferryman does so, and for payment, they shake gold from themselves into the boat. This alarms the ferryman, for if the gold had gone into the river, it would overflow. He forces the will-o'-the-wisps to agree to pay him three artichokes, three cabbages, and three onions. The ferryman takes the gold up to a high place, and deposits it in a rocky cleft, where it is discovered by a green snake. The snake eats the gold and becomes luminous, allowing him to observe an underground temple where there is an old man with a lamp which can only give light when another light is present. The snake investigates the temple and finds four kings made of metal: one of gold, one silver, one bronze, and one a mixture of all three. The story then switches over to the wife of the old man, who meets a melancholy prince. He has met a beautiful Lily, but his happiness is prevented by the fact that anyone who touches her will die. The snake is able to form a temporary bridge across the river at midday, and in this way, the wife and prince come to Lily's garden, where she is mourning her fate. As twilight falls, the prince succumbs to his desire for the beautiful Lily, rushes towards her, and dies. The green snake encircles the prince, and the old man, his wife, and the will-o'-the-wisps form a procession and cross the river on the back of the snake. Back in the land of the senses, and guided by the old man, Lily is able to bring the prince back to life — albeit in a dream state — by touching both the snake and the prince. The snake sacrifices itself, transforming itself into a pile of precious stones, which are then thrown into the river. The old man then directs them towards the doors of the temple, which are locked. The will-o'-the-wisps help them enter by eating the gold out of the doors. At this point, the temple is magically transported beneath the river, surfacing beneath the ferryman's hut, which transforms into a silver altar. The three kings bestow gifts upon the sleeping prince and restore him. The fourth, mixed king collapses as the will-o'-the-wisps lick the veins of gold out of him. We also find that Lily's touch no longer brings death. Thus, the prince is united with the beautiful Lily, and they are married. When they look out from the temple, they see a permanent bridge which spans the river — the result of the snake's sacrifice — 'and to the present hour the Bridge is swarming with travellers, and the Temple is the most frequented on the whole Earth'. It has been claimed that Das Märchen was born out of Goethe's reading of The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz and that it is full of esoteric symbolism. In 1786, Goethe observed that The Chymical Wedding contains 'a pretty fairy story' for which he had no time at the moment. Rudolf Steiner, in his 1918 book Goethe's Standard of the Soul , speaks of it as follows: 'On the river stands the Temple in which the marriage of the Young Man with the Lily takes place. The ‘marriage’ with the supersensible, the realisation of the free personality, is possible in a human soul whose forces have been brought into a state of regularity that in comparison with the usual state is a transformation.' This article led to an invitation to speak to the German Theosophical Society which eventually led to Steiner becoming its General Secretary. Tom Raines gives the following historical background for 'The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily' : This Fairy Tale was written by Goethe as a response to a work of Schiller’s entitled Über die aesthetische Erziehung des Menschen (Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man). One of the main thoughts considered in these ‘letters’ centred around the question of human freedom... Schiller saw that a harmonious social life could only be founded on the basis of free human personalities. He saw that there was an 'ideal human being' within everyone and the challenge was to bring the outer life experiences into harmony with this 'ideal'. Then the human being would lead a truly worthy existence. Schiller was trying to build an inner bridge between the Person in the immediate reality and the 'ideal human being'. He wrote these ‘Letters’ during the time and context of the French Revolution. This revolution was driven by a desire for outer social changes to enable human personalities to become free. But both Schiller and Goethe recognised that freedom cannot be ‘imposed’ from the outside but must arise from within each person. Whilst he had an artistic nature, Schiller was more at home in the realm of philosophic thoughts and although Goethe found much pleasure in these ‘Letters’ of Schiller, he felt that the approach concerning the forces in the soul was too simply stated and, it should be said, working in abstract ideas was not Goethe's way. So he set about writing a Fairy Tale that would show, in imaginative pictures, the way in which a human soul could become whole and free, thereby giving rise to a new and free human community. And this was published in Die Horen in 1795. Source: Wikipedia Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

14th February 1944 Mi.P244 14th February 1944 Mi.P244 1/1 Official postcard (Mi.P244a - 'Frageteil)) sent from Bad Harzburg. The postcard was originally sold for the correspondence of foreign labourers employed in the area of the Brussels Air District Command. These 'reply' cards being separated into 'Frageteil' and 'Antwortteil' sections to make individual cards and overprinted. Ref: 14.02.1944 Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

24th July 1944 GTKG 42-36- 24th July 1944 GTKG 42-36- 1/0 Get To Know Germany Series 42-36- Se 24.07.1944 - 26/64 (42-36-1-B6) Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

17th April 1944 17th April 1944 17.04.1944 Regensburg Labour Camp Delivery Note reverse.jpeg 17.04.1944 Regensburg Labour Camp Delivery Note reverse.jpeg 1/1 A vorbindezettel pre-tie slip (Type 14 - Feldpostsammelstelle Passau - unused on print side), with typed and manuscript parcel and address details to reverse. Sent from the post office at 'Civilian Internee and Labour Camp', Regensburg. Ref: 17.04.1944 With no identifying address from the sender, the parcel must be assumed to have come from one of the following work camps in Regensburg: Signalmeisterei, Reichsban, Lager Ostendorfenstrasse, 1940-45, housed 160 men Reichsbahn on Kirchmaierstrasse, 1943-45, housed 150 men Reichsbahnlager on Nockherkeiler, 1943-45, housed 200 persons Messerschmitt Contact Brief History to inform us of additonal information regarding this page

19th May 1944 19th May 1944 19.05.1944 Minsk reverse.jpeg 19.05.1944 Minsk reverse.jpeg 1/1 Feldpost cover sent from the 'Bahnbetriebswerk' (Railway Depot) in Minsk to FPN 19375N. Ref: 19.05.1944 Minsk Bahnbetriebswerk and the Minsk Offensive of June 1944 From Wikipedia: 'On the eve of the offensive, Soviet partisans carried out large-scale sabotage activities behind enemy lines, aimed at disrupting Army Group Center's logistical and communications capabilities. Some 10,500 explosives were detonated along the rail networks connecting the Dnieper to Minsk, all bridges in the area were blown up, and telephone lines extensively cut, paralyzing Army Group Center's communications for the first 48 hours of the offensive.' Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

5th September 1944 5th September 1944 1/1 Durch Deutsche Dienspost Alpenvorland. Registered cover from Meran to Altenburg. (Most likely) featuring official postage stamps Mi.166 (3 Pf), Mi.167 (4 Pf), Mi.173 (15 Pf) and Mi.174 (20 Pf). Ref: 05.09.1944

19th June 1944 Stalag IV-G 19th June 1944 Stalag IV-G Screenshot 2021-11-27 at 09.29.50.png Screenshot 2021-11-27 at 09.29.50.png 1/1 Stalag IV-G Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

8th August 1944 Stalag IX-B 8th August 1944 Stalag IX-B Screenshot 2021-11-27 at 09.29.50.png Screenshot 2021-11-27 at 09.29.50.png 1/1 Stalag IX-B Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page

14th March 1944 14th March 1944 1/1 Official correspondence from the Mayors Office in Waiblingen regarding the annual tax assessment. Featuring official 12 Pf postage stamp (most likely Mi.172). Ref: 14.03.1944

2nd August 1941 Wieda (Südharz) 2nd August 1941 Wieda (Südharz) 1/1 Postcard depicting an aerial view of Wieda (Südharz). Ref: 02.08.1941 Wieda (Südharz) Wieda is a village and a former municipality in the district of Göttingen, in Lower Saxony, Germany. Since 1 November 2016, it is part of the municipality Walkenried. Wieda is on River Wieda, a tributary of Zorge in the southern part of the Harz mountains. Source: Wikipedia WIEDA (BUCHENWALD, MITTELBAU, AND SACHSENHAUSEN) (SS- BB III). The SS- Baubrigade III was based in Wieda , a small village in the Harz Mountains, from May 1944 to April 1945. The location put it in the radius of the Mittelbau concentration camp complex then being established. Hans Kammler, head of Amtsgruppe C (Construction) in the SS- Business Administration Main Office (WVHA), was responsible for establishing this camp. After the sites for assembling the long- distance A4 (Aggregat 4) rocket (the later V-2) were bombed, Albert Speer, Adolf Hitler, and Heinrich Himmler decided in mid-August 1943 to push for the enlargement, 'with the heavy utilisation' of concentration camp prisoners, of an underground facility in the Harz Mountains. Himmler appointed Kammler to carry out the construction. The whole project was coordinated under the so- called Mittelwerk GmbH, established in September 1943. Kammler wanted to use the SS construction brigades to build a new rail line so the existing Osterhagen to Nordhausen line could be used exclusively for armaments industry transportation. The Mittelwerk GmbH entrusted management and construction of the rail line to the Deutsche Reichsbahn (German Railways), which in turn revived an older plan to build a 22- kilometer- long (13.7- mile- long) track (called the 'Helmetalbahn') south of the existing line and through the Helme valley. The Berlin company Tiefbau AG Julius Berger undertook the major excavation work. The construction of Helmetalbahn dominated the prisoners’ life until the end of the war. SS- Baubrigade III was assigned the westernmost of the three construction zones, the section from Osterhagen to Mackenrode. The administration for this section was in Mackenrode, and the SS- Baubrigade III established three subcamps along this part of the line: at Osterhagen, Nüxei, and Mackenrode. After the Cologne camp with its remaining 311 prisoners of the SS- BB III was dismantled, and the Wieda camp was set up, the brigade began its work on 16th May 1944. Then 700 prisoners from the Buchenwald concentration camp joined them on 7th June 1944. An empty club house of a marksmen’s association formed the center of the camp in Wieda . Around it were other buildings that served as the brigade’s administrative offices, a kitchen, a laundry, and an infirmary, and the grounds were fenced in and outfitted with watchtowers. On average, about 100 prisoners were housed here. Living conditions in this auxiliary camp generally were better than in the sub-camps, especially as Wieda had the central kitchen. In addition, inmates here did not have to do exhausting construction work but, instead, either remained in the camp, built barracks in Niedersachswerfen, worked for private persons, or were set to work in or by the communal administration. Brigade guards lived in barracks built for them close to the camp. Unlike in Cologne, where police and auxiliaries had been recruited, here the SS relied on Luftwaffe soldiers, in any case available because the Luftwaffe was having difficulties with its supply lines. They came under the command of the SS as of 1st September 1944. In January 1945, the SS- Baubrigade III guards included an SS leader, 42 SS noncommissioned officers, and 132 SS men. The integration of the Wieda camp into the system of camps centered on Mittelbau meant death loomed more sharply over the prisoners. A small infirmary was set up in Wieda for minor cases, while other cases were sent to the Buchenwald auxiliary camp Dora or, starting in May 1944, to the Ellrich- Juliushütte camp that became part of Mittelbau and after January 1945 to the Boelcke- Kaserne. After June 1944, all transports to and from the construction brigade went through Mittelbau, without exception. As of July 1944, the guard details came under the control of the 'SS- Standort Mittelbau'; and by October 1944, the construction brigades in the Harz came under the control of what had become the independent Mittelbau concentration camp. The transfer of control in January 1945 to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp was proforma. In the first few weeks, a surprisingly strong interaction developed between the Wieda camp and the surrounding community. Soldiers serving as guards played soccer with the prisoners on the sports field, and it is said that after the game they all marched singing through the village. One female villager reported: 'In the first weeks after the camp was set up, it was like the annual fair. After work, in the evenings, the prisoners sat in the cleared area in front of the marksmen’s tent, and some of them, especially the Gypsies, had instruments, mandolins or guitars, and made music. Many villagers, both young and old, stopped on the main street in front of the barbed- wire fence to listen in. This apparent lack of discipline in the camp resulted in the dismissal, in June 1944, of Karl Völkner as leader of the construction brigade. He had been in command since September 1942 and was now transferred to the Flossenbürg concentration camp. Until 20th July 1944, a certain SS- Oberscharführer Freys, who had been at the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria, temporarily replaced him. SS- Obersturmführer Fritz Behrens replaced him in turn. Following Behrens’s appointment, conditions in the camp deteriorated, and prisoners were replaced. On 27th July 1944, groups of prisoners from SS- Baubrigade III were taken away to Dora from the sites where they were working. Two days later, around 1,000 new prisoners from Dora filled the four camps. With this ruthless replacement, relationships that had developed over the course of a year and a half between at least some of the prisoners were broken. Paul Rassinier, who learned about the SS- Baubrigade III while in the Dora infirmary, accurately remarked that 'in less than two months, Wieda became as hard and inhumane as Dora.' Behrens remained the leader of SS- Baubrigade III until just before the end of the war but was replaced in early April 1945 by SS- Untersturmführer Karl Merkle. Some 16 deaths are registered as having occurred up to the time the brigade came under the control of Mittelbau. During the summer, the living conditions deteriorated rapidly, so that by the end of August 1944, 300 prisoners incapable of working were taken away to the Ellrich- Juliushütte camp. The main reason for prisoner exhaustion lay in the heavy construction work demanded of them; the pace of work dictated by Kammler and the Armaments Ministry was also repeatedly increased. According to Georges Pieper, camp elder (Lagerältester) and Kapo in the construction brigade’s office and hence a good source, death rates increased markedly in the winter of 1944–1945: he recalls 74 prisoners dying between 30th December 1944, and 7th April 1945. In early 1945, the SS- Baubrigade III received Jewish prisoners for the first time: about 200 of them were transferred from Dora, though by the end of March they were transferred to the SS- Baubrigade IV. For the most part the railway line was double-tracked, and many bridges and sections were already finished when work had to stop at the end of March 1945 due to the advancing Allied forces. In a report prepared after the war by the building department of the Reichsbahn office in Kassel, the mass use of prisoners received only scant mention: 'In 1944/45, a new rail line for goods traffic from Osterhagen to Nordhausen was built to relieve the Northeim to Nordhausen line, length about thirty kilometers [18.6 miles.] . . . Several thousand men (prisoners and concentration camp inmates) worked on it. Work stopped at the end of the war due to the American advance.' On 5th April 1945, the prisoners from the Nüxei and Mackenrode subcamps were taken to Wieda , and the next day, so were the prisoners from the Osterhagen subcamp. On 7th April, 135 prisoners were marched, in a northwesterly direction, through the Harz Mountains. A train took those who were ill, numbering somewhat more than 300. On 9th April 1945, SS- Baubrigade III, now reassembled, left the Wernigerode railroad station in a single train: camp leader Merkle had by now disappeared. The train made it as far as Letzlingen, a village north of Magdeburg at about the same latitude as Berlin. About 900 prisoners were able to flee here during a bombing raid, though during the course of the day, 200 were recaptured and returned to the train by SS guards. The SS then forced these 200 on a march at whose end, on 24th April 1945, 50 prisoners remained to be liberated. Some in this group were able to escape en route, but most had collapsed dead by the wayside or had been shot. A second group of around 600 prisoners who had been recaptured near Letzlingen was marched in a southeasterly direction. Here, too, there were mass escapes and shootings, whereby civilians and men from the German Home Guard (Volkssturm) particularly distinguished themselves. Around 500 prisoners of this group were liberated near Burgstall on 14th April 1945. The ill, who remained behind on the train at Letzlingen, were probably the victims of the infamous massacre at Gardelegen. According to estimates by historian Joachim Neander, of the 1,135 prisoners who left Wieda , only about 700 lived long enough to experience liberation. Source: muse.jhu.edu ( The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945, Volume I) Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page