Brigitte Hamann says her book  is based on a diary given to her by relatives of Dr. Eduard Bloch , who lived in Hitler’s home town of Linz in Austria. Hitler regarded him as an “edeljude” – a noble Jew – and never forgot the kindness he showed his mother Klara  when he treated her for… Read more »

The Afrika Korps was formed February 19, 1941, after the German Armed Forces High Command had decided to send an expeditionary force to Libya to support the Italian army, which had been routed by an Allied counteroffensive, Operation Compass. The German expeditionary force, commanded by Erwin Rommel, at first consisted only of the 5th Panzer… Read more »

Estimates for the total number of casualties in the war vary, because many deaths went unrecorded. Most suggest that some 60 million people died in the war, including about 20 million military personnel and 40 million civilians. Many of the civilians died because of deliberate genocide, massacres, mass-bombings, diseases and starvation.      The Soviet Union lost around… Read more »

Margarete “Marga” Boden was born, 09-09-1893  in Goncerzewo near Bromberg. the daughter of landowner Hans Boden and his wife Elfriede, whose maiden name was Popp. Margarete had four brothers and a sister. In 1909, she attended the Höhere Töchterschule (Higher Girls School) in Bromberg, a city in northern Poland. Margarete trained and worked as a nurse during the First World War followed by a stint at… Read more »

Albert Frey,  born 16 February 1913 was a Standartennführer in the 1st SS Division Leibstandarte  SS Adolf Hitler . He was born in Heidelberg, the son of a master baker. In December 1933 he joined the SS-Verfügungstruppe. In 1937 as an SS Oberscharführer (Staff Sergeant), he attended the SS Junker school at Brunswick  where he came out… Read more »

Jannetje Johanna (Jo) Schaft (16 September 1920 – 17 April 1945) was a Dutch communist resistance fighter during World War II.     She became known as the girl with the red hair (in Dutch Het meisje met het rode haar, also the title of a book and film about her). Her secret name in the resistance movement was Hannie. Hannie Schaft was born… Read more »

The Sturmabteilung, SA ,  meaning Storm Detachment or Assault Division, in Nazi Germany, functioned as the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. It played a significant key role in Adolf Hitler rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s.  Their primary purposes were providing protection for Nazi rallies and assemblies, disrupting the meetings of opposing parties, fighting against the paramilitary units of… Read more »

Snipers of the Soviet Union played an important role mainly on the Eastern Front of World War II, apart from other preceding and subsequent conflicts. In World War II, Soviet snipers used the 7.62x54R rifle cartridge with light, heavy, armour-piercing (B-30), armour-piercing-incendiary (B-32), zeroing-and-incendiary (P3), and tracer bullets. Most Soviet World War II snipers carried a combat load of 120 rifle cartridges in the field. Unlike… Read more »

German submarine U-864 was a Type IX U-boat of Nazi Germany’s Kriegsmarine in World War II. She throughout her entire career under command by Korvettenkapitän Ralf-Reimar Wolfram  departed from Kiel on 5 December 1944 on her last mission, to transport to Japan a large quantity of mercury and parts and engineering drawings for German jet fighters. While returning to Bergen, Norway to repair a… Read more »

At the outbreak of World War II, there were no large scale evacuation of civilians in Germany as there was in Britain. From early 1940, KLV was extended to children under the age of 10 but participation was voluntary. Adolf Hitler personally intervened following the Royal Air Force bombing of Berlin on 24-09-1940, instructing the evacuation of children from areas at… Read more »