Identifying service information for my Great Grandfather in the German army, WWII

[EestiLatt]

I'm not sure if anyone has more ability than I do with this, but I had just posted a photo of him and someone identified the uniform and sword as being polizei, Liutenant (which matches up to what we were told of his rank).

Information on him:
Name: Gert Lätt
Nationality: Estonian
Place of birth: Tartu, Estonia, 1903 (I have traced his ancestors back in Estonia nearly 500 years, so they were there for a very, very long time and judging by the ancestral name Tudaka, were definitely coming from a line distinctly non-western surnames - turns out there are people in Mongolia with this surname which matches up with our gene mapping that identified some ancestry as East Asian - possibly Yakut who are genetically linked to Mongolians though they speak a Turkic language).
This is ODD, because he did have family members who had Eurasian mixed features and yet he was allowed to join the German army in WWII, of all times.

Years served:
I'm not certain - he was in the Estonian army initially - it is likely he or his father were involved with the Estonian Forest Brotherhood (an anti-Russian guerilla movement). The family fled Estonia in 1940 or 1941 and went to Germany (it was that or face Siberian concentration camps which several relatives ended up in). I believe he did not serve until the end of the war because for some reason he was to be shot by a nazi firing squad - I know he had a severe dislike for them so this may have contributed - and he escaped on foot over the mountains. They did not come over to the US until many years later.
Wounded by gunfire 7 times during the war - not sure if they were American or Russian bullets - probably Russian - so I think he would have fought on the Eastern front. I lived with him when I was small and he certainly had the scars still. I do not know if he received any medals for this, especially since he was not German.

I'm curious if anyone has access to records from this era what his unit would have been and how it is he came to be shot 7 times if he was polizei (I thought they didn't fight?). It is also worth mentioning, I think, that he seemed to, according to his daughter (my Grandmother) and her sister (who is still alive as of writing this, but whom we have not heard from in years) - both of which were in Germany with their mother - possess some foreknowledge of American or Soviet bombings - I am unsure who was bombing where and when. On many occasions, he contacted the family and told them to get out of a city before it was bombed - and on several occasions, he was right - within 24 hours, there were bombings from airplanes - in one case he did not reach them in time and nearly they were wiped out by a firebombing that destroyed nearly everything but the house they were hiding in. So either by sheer dumb luck or him somehow having intel on when bombings were happening am I here to write this now.

Rank: I think Lt. (the equivalent of)

I just always found it interesting and he would never, EVER tell us much when he was still around - he didn't like to talk about it. The most we got out of him were his writings on the seven "miracles" of his life - one of which included narrowly avoiding the bayonette of a Russian soldier running him down on horseback as a boy, and of course, surviving being shot so many times and avoiding the firing squad and managing to survive going over the mountains on foot during winter.

What, exactly, would a Polizei Lt. be doing during the war? How would he know about the bombings beforehand? Why would he be sentenced to die by firing squad? I was told because he refused to join the party but I doubt that is reason enough. I know that his cousin was a spy - he was shot by firing squad in 1941 in Tallinn, Estonia by the Russians for giving intel to the British - so I do know both hate for the Nazis and Russians runs deep throughout the family.

[EestiLatt]

Another note: I just read that police had to be German citizens of aryan descent, but he was neither - he was born in Estonia, and he did not have blonde hair or blue eyes - and again, while his features were fairly typical of Eastern Europeans, he had direct family members with him who had distinctly Eurasian mixed features. How in the HECK did he manage to join the polizei? For the record, his wife also came from a partly Jewish, Balkan, Greek and west Asian background. I guess she didn't "look the part", but they sure weren't doing their research very well!

[Paul D]

Have you tried posting on this website ? There are some very knowledgable Estonian reseachers and historians on there !

- foorum.rindeleht.ee

[EestiLatt]

I have not- thanks very much!