Dienstmütze, Seide, schwarz, für Führer bis Standartenführer

[Friedrich-Berthold]

I was inclined to, however, I bore witness to some of the personal attacks upon you and your efforts to spread factual, evidence-based knowledge and decided to stick to our little siloed section here. This section seems to detract those invaders from other fora with rants about "skulls" ,the unfairness of life, and their unwarranted disdain for "cheerleaders" of the study of history, especially within its context.

I happen to be fond of cheerleaders of all varieties.

FB, thank you for your efforts here. I am without a doubt benefited by it. I am not a trained historian and likely will never be, however, I truly appreciate the guidance of a genuine one.

Thanks so much. I am delighted with your collection and thankful to you for your support and example. Moreover, I am seized of absolutely no envy at your things
whatsoever, as is common here. I think your collection is marvelous and your citizenship of this space is even better. I do know that some here suffer with burdens of economy and society that are capricious and wholly wrong, and I am very sorry about this fact. As to those who recently have assaulted me, we have booted some of them out, and the others are their own reward. As the Germans say: so as you call into the forest comes the echo. Without facts anyone who aspires to collect especially this kind of thing faces very painful disappointment. Ihnen alle Gute und weiter so!

[HPL2008]

It appears that a totenkopf ring and ehrendolch were awarded. Maybe they will surface one day too.

Those, and a Reichssportabzeichen in Bronze and an SA-Sportabzeichen in Silber as well.

For the benefit of the non-German speaking / non-Sütterlin-reading members, I'll add a summary/translation of his personal data from the above documents soon.

[harryamb2]

People have the Gaul to attack you and your knowledge,F-B I cant believe it.

[HPL2008]

Here's what the documents tell us:

Erich Heinrich was born on 3rd February 1903 in Falkenberg. He later moved to Grimma in Saxony, where he lived at Schmidtstraße 10. Later still, his place of residence was at the SS barracks at Fischendorf/Leisnig, also in Saxony.

Heinrich was of Protestant faith, married and the father of one daughter. He was a Kistenmacher [box maker] by civilian trade.

He was 170 centimeters tall; his shoe size was 42.5 and his hat size 56.

At 16 years of age, he joined the Freikorps, serving from 18th June 1919 until 7th January 1920 with the 2. Eskadron Kavallerie-Schützen-Korps [2nd Squadron, Cavalry Rifles Corps] and the Infanterie-Schieß-Schule [Infantry Shooting School] at Wünsdorf/Berlin. During this time, he suffered a gunshot wound to his right ear while fighting in the suppression of the 1919 Spartakus riots in Berlin.

He seamlessly continued his military service when he was taken over by the provisional Reichswehr on 8th January 1920.
He served with Reiter-Regiment 38 [Cavalry Regiment 38], then 37; Infanterie-Regiment 11 [Infantry Regiment 11] at Leipzig and finally 3. Eskadron Reiter-Regiment 12 [3rd Squadron, Cavalry Regiment 12].
Having completed a total of 12 years of service (including his time in the Freikorps) and thus the standard service term for enlisted ranks in the Reichswehr, he was discharged on 30th November 1931.
His rank at the time of discharge was Wachtmeister [not to be confused with the eponymous police rank, this designation was traditionally used instead of Feldwebel in the cavalry and artillery branch], to which he had been promoted on 1st August 1931.

During his time in the army, Heinrich was trained as a Pionier [combat engineer] and in the operation of light machine guns and Minenwerfer [trench mortars].
His subsequent training while with the SS included the Gewehr 98 rifle, the Luger P08 pistol and, once again, light machine guns and trench mortars. His marksmanship skills were of the Scharfschütze [sharpshooter] level.

He held a Class I and Class IIIb drivers' license (i.e. for motorcycles and motorcars).

On 1st December 1931, he joined both the NSDAP (with party no. 819,883) and the SS (with SS no. 51,589).
At an unknown later date, he also joined the Lebensborn e.V.*


Duty assignments/service history:

• 1st Dec. 1931: joined the 2nd Sturm of the V. Standarte of the 7. SS-Brigade.
• 15th Sept. 1932: transferred to the 48. SS-Standarte due to organizational reforms; serving as an instructor with this Standarte up until 26th March 1933.
• 27th March 1933: transferred to the 2nd Sturm of the II. Sturmbann of the 48. SS-Standarte; serving as the Sturm's commander.
• 13th November or 2nd Dec. 1933 (contradictory data on the cards): Assigned as temporary acting commander of the II. Sturmbann of the 48. SS-Standarte.
• 19th April 1934: Confirmed in this appointment as permanent commander.
• 2nd August 1934: Sworn in.
• Unknown date in 1934: Became a full-time, salaried SS member.
• 1st April 1935: Transferred from the Allgemeine SS to the SS-Verfügungstruppe; joined the SS-Pioniersturmbann.
• 18th May 1935: The commander of SS-Oberabschnitt Mitte, Frhr. von Eberstein requested Heinrich's assignment as a depot administrator for the Pioniersturmbann. Originally, Heinrich was to become the Pioniersturmbann's administrative officer, with subsequent plans to make him a platoon leader. For reasons unspecified in this letter, this was not possible.
• 1st Nov. 1935: Appointed as 2. Verwaltungsführer [2nd Administrative Officer] of the SS-Pioniersturmbann.
• Unknown date between Nov. 1937 and Dec. 1938: Transferred to the III. Sturmbann of SS-Regiment "Germania"*
• For an unknown period, but definitely by 1st October 1943 and still on 1st October 1944: Served with the staff of the Befehlshaber der Waffen-SS in den Niederlanden [Commander of the Waffen-SS in the Netherlands]*

Received a simple reprimand on 11th Nov. 1937.


Promotion dates:

• 1st Dec. 1931 - SS-Anwärter
• 1st Jan. 1933 - SS-Mann
• 1st Jan. 1933 - SS-Scharführer
• 15th Aug. 1933 - SS-Truppführer
• 9th Nov. 1933 - SS-Sturmführer
• 9th Nov. 1934 - SS-Obersturmführer
• 11th Sept. 1938 - SS-Hauptsturmführer*
• 30th Jan. 1942 - SS-Sturmbannführer*

Awards and decorations:

• Eisernes Kreuz 2. Klasse [Iron Cross 2nd Class]*
• Kriegsverdienstkreuz 1. Klasse mit Schwertern [War Merit Cross 1st Class with Swords]*
• Kriegsverdienstkreuz 2. Klasse mit Schwertern [War Merit Cross 2nd Class with Swords]*
• Deutsches Reichssportabzeichen in Bronze [German National Sports Badge in Bronze]
• SA-Sportabzeichen in Silber [SA Sports Badge in Silver]
• SS-Totenkopfring [SS Death's Head Ring]
• Ehrendegen des RFSS [Honor Sword of the RFSS]
• Ehrendolch der SS [Honor Dagger of the SS]
• Ehrenwinkel für Alte Kämpfer [Honor Chevron for Old Fighters]
• SS-Zivilabzeichen [SS Civilian Badge] (no. 25,301)

*) Not on the file cards, but added from data in the Dienstalterslisten der SS of 1st Dec. 1938, 1st October 1943 and 1st October 1944 and the Dienstaltersliste der Waffen-SS of 1st July 1944.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Bravo, Andreas!

[HPL2008]

Bravo, Andreas!

Thank you! I just added a little more data from the wartime officers' seniority lists.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Bravo, and Andreas is an example for some of the skeptics, doubters, and otherwise persons who have recently cast a jaundiced eye on the happy labor of our group.

Moltke the Elder said it best: Genie ist Fleiss!

[stonemint]

Dr, kudos to you for having the refined taste to pursue such a fine cap, and kudos on your photography skills--I wish more people would capture the details like you did.....

[DrCMH]

Dr, kudos to you for having the refined taste to pursue such a fine cap, and kudos on your photography skills--I wish more people would capture the details like you did.....

Thank you Chris,

I wanted to get the most detail of the weave. The detail with the flash, though not visually pretty, does a good job of this. It even picked up what to look for in the Samt band.

[DrCMH]

Andreas,

Thank you for your translation, as FB has stated before, you are a genius. I'm going to work through the Sütterlinschrift in his Lebenslauf, if I hit a brick wall perhaps I could reach out to you for some help?