Snapshots from the Ostfront.

the shoes for the Orel winter are the latest fashion...

 

Two latest additions to the collection......

This one has 'Poland 4 June 1941' handwritten on the reverse. Just about 18 days before Barbarossa......



Kharkov, with its extraordinary, Stalinist administration blocks, became a much-photographed 'tourist attraction' for the Wehrmacht. Here's one for the folks back home...

 

Looks like another busy market day in Kharkow...

 

Beautifiul pictures of the same building in Kharkov

http://www.stuckincustoms.com/category/travel/ukraine/kharkov/

 

Wonder what those men's thoughts were in the first picture (the pre-Barbarossa one)... chilling to think about.

 

From all accounts I've read, it was pretty much 'The Fuhrer knows what he is doing...'

 

That's the idea I get too from the accounts. But on a personal level... wow.

 

I recall reading that there was also talk among men that they would be shipped through the USSR to attack the British troops in the Middle East....

 

Yes - Carell's 'Hitler's War On Russia' begins with that quote.

 

http://victory.rusarchives.ru/index.php?p=32&sec_id=67

 

Just acquired this little set from an antiques dealer in Germany. Obviously, they have been removed from a private photo album.

Occasionally, in the fun and interest of collecting, I feel that I'm intruding on something private - that I'm looking at something which was intensely personal and also tragic.

Just two photos - the first is dated 21/7/41 on the reverse and I'm guessing is from the 'Barbarossa' period. Horst Miatki is on the left...



The next is a more formal picture....



With an inscription on the rear which, from the wording, is written by the soldier himself...





This translates as : -

' Your old friend as 'ancient warrior' : Horst '

' Russia, May 1942'

And then, the inscription from the album : -



Somehow, this struck me as very sad.

 

Somewhere in Russia...the distances are huge...

 

Great 'Barbarossa' pics, Kai......

 

Cheers Martin, here´s some more....the vastness and death everywhere...











And goodbye to Comrades...

 

Add some corn and that is Nebraska.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Endless-Steppe-Growing-Siberia/dp/006440577X

 

If they only knew what was in store for them!

 

If there is a way to identify a name on the grave then I can find the exact place .

Also the picture with the windmill is most likey Ukraine during the Summer of 1941. ( note the blossoming flowers and ukraine was the wheat attic of the Soviets those days). Note the sandy earth which supposes a dry Summer too.

 

After a lengthy break, I've added a couple more to my collection.

A poor quality snap, but again, I'm fascinated by those Eastern Front 'Vormarsch' photos showing the mighty, mechanized Wehrmacht.....here we see a cyclist, some mounted infantry, a long line of foot-slogging landsers eating the dust of a motorcyclist and some lucky men in cars. The horizon looks featureless and endless...and it looks like a hot day.



And another very familiar snapshot. According to an inscription on the rear, this is the grave of Leutnant Otto Kruger buried at Rschew on the Volga, 7th April 1942....

 

Otto seems to be "in good company"... serving the Fatherland...