I have some questions, Can you help me?

What brought me to this forums is, My Oma and Opa (Grandma and Grandpa) are from Germany my mother was also born in Germany. They moved to the US in the 60's. My Oma and Opa will not discuss WW2 with me. They do not talk about it at all! I've heard a few things but it wasn't that informing.

What brought me here is I have some pictures of who I think is my Oma's brother. The it looked like he is in a military uniform. The picture was taken in Spring 1941, on the back of the picture is writing but its in German and I do not know German. I also have another picture of him from 1955, in between that period of time there is no other photos of him. So I came here looking for help, to see if anybody know what he might have done in the military. He has no SS symobles on his uniform, so I am very confused and I'm looking to see if anybody can give me any information.

 

From the first photo he's Luftwaffe (airforce) probably Aircraftman 1st class, possibly Flight Sgt/Ensign. The badges were quite similar.

As for the SS symbols, these would only be won by members of the SS, and they were in the minority. Your uncle was a regular member of the German Airforce so hence no SS badge.

Confused? Well don't worry about it, collectively we can help but there's a limit to what we can tell you from a couple of photos. I've sent you a message explaining what you need if you'd like to track down further info.

The first scan, the back of the Kodak photo card, doesn't seem to be large enough to show everything written. Any chance of another?

Oma and Opa very likely had a rotten time of it, which is very likely why they'd prefer not to discuss it. Gentle further prodding might help, but the emphasis should be on the gentle with an eye on respecting their decision of not mentioning those dark days anymore.

Good Luck!

 

Hello Tanya, your opa had the rank of a Gefreiter in the Luftwaffe.

Would it be possible to scan the whole postcard? It says it was written during the Spring of 1941. Was oma's name Monica?

 

I have a better picture.
OT- but does anybody know if Ancestry.com Is a good genealogy site? I'm trying to find family now, and I'm reading more into WW2

 

This would have been my Oma's brother. My Oma's name is Katharina, I think she may have got the photo's from a family member.

 

That would make sense , the sütterling handwriting is hard to guess, so Monica was my first choice when I read the name, but Katherina makes perfectly sense . I will try to decypher more later today.

Just so you know, the Luftwaffe staff did not often like Nazis, in fact many did not like them at all.

 

Tanja I sent you a PM, don’t know if it worked.

My and a friends guess on the text is:

Gesundheit
von Deinem
Bruder Max
Frühjahr 1941
=
Blessings
from Your
Brother Max
Spring 1941

Could it be the City of Passau, Grunaustr.2 ? I found a Grunaustrasse in Passau.