HELP: STALINGRAD "permit to fly out of the pocket". Have a look at this. Never seen this before.

[Ozmen]

Hi guys.... i wasn't really sure which forum to post this in, as the choices were limited. I have neither heard of this item, not come across it, however it seems both appealling and unique as i have never come across such an item before.... and that in itself sets alarm bells ringing.

I thought I woudl both share it with you... and ask for your thoughts on it. The seller is wanting 85 USD for it, and I feel it is a poigniant reminder of the betrayal of the 6th Army in Stalingrad by Hitler.

Below is the narrative that accompanied it..... let me know what you think guys:

"
Authentic German WWII: Red Round Permit to Fly out of the Stalingrad Pocket. It was found at Gumrak. This permits to leave the besieged 6th German Army by means of airplane. Were issued only to hard wounded soldiers, and also in special cases of subordinates to approval of the high command. There were two types of such permits - the first in the form of a rhombus, the second was round, such as you see on a photo. Made from steel. Because of time lead to the ground, the exhibit has a little rusted, but still in a good condition, with a lot of an original red paint on both sides. Stalingrad permits were painted in different colors: red – for wounded, white - for the other reasons (For example evacuation of the valuable military staff), yellow (round) - give out in case of heavy illness (Especially Rare!). Size of tag – 40mm.
"

Any thoughts on it guys ? It really does sound plausible.

[Glenn66]

I'd be REALLY wary on this one, I know there were different tags to signify different things, wound severity and status from memory. There were round and diamond shapes and different colours. Argument goes on as to the meaning of each colour/shape. A web search should give some information.

What concerns me is I can't see any way to determine authenticity, earlier this week I saw a group buy of maybe a dozen of these for I think about $150 out of Poland and maybe it's the cynic in me but theres alot of fake stuff comes out of Poland these days and a stamped piece of rusty steel is not hard to copy.

Oddly enough I've only ever seen these for sale associated with Stalingrad and surely these must have been used service-wide for medical evacuations? Don't quote me on that as it's only a guess, it's just that I'm suspicious of a large number of supposedly 'rare' items for sale on ebay and other auction sites at the same time, especially items that are easy to fake. Prices i've seen seem to go anywhere from $50 to $140 each.

It's your call...

Glenn

[Ozmen]

I know Glenn.... sounds such a fantastic story, but i agree with you... I wish it was so simpel as to have a stamp on it saying "Yep, i was from Stalingrad and it was for evacuation, and i am genuine"... as time goes on and survivors of the conflict pass away, all we can do is rely on some document on the internet confirming the validity of it.

Thanks for your comments and input

[Laplander]

Hello.
These round and diamond shape metal tags are Luftwaffe cargo tags.
They were attached to wooden boxes/crates and helped Luftwaffe cargoloading staff to know weight and how fragile the items were.
They have been found in great numbers near airfields in Italy, France, Germany and Russia.
I have a few from eastern front, cool items but not a ticket out of Stalingrad.

Best regards
Anders

[Paul D]

Exactly right Anders these tags began to be sold from Stalingrad quite a few years ago as tags to allow the evacuation of the wounded , however enquiries with stalingrad veterans showed that this was rubbish and they are in fact as Anders has stated luftwaffe freight tags.

His story is about as bad as his price , 85 dollars what a laugh !!

[Walkwolf]

These tags are rather new to me on this side of the pond.
I had never seen one until a couple years ago, on-line.
Maybe $5 or $10. Anything more is insane, IMO.