Description:

WAFFEN-SS SOLDIER'S DIARY
An official SS diary/day book issued to Waffen-SS Sturmann Helmut Wons of Berlin, a member of the 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS. The book, "DerSoldatenfreund Taschenjahrbuch fur die Wehrmacht...1944", SS edition [Hannover: Adolf Spanholtz Verlag], 3" x 5", has black cardboard covers with SS runes embossed in one corner. Entries are very few and very sporadic: "I was drafted into the SS 31 March 1943...my one year anniversary at Budapest...". He mentions travels through Vienna, Hungary, and to several cities in Italy, a trip on an amphibious car near Pisa, and later noting: "...we were welcomed by artillery fire...shrapnel was flying about...we did not know we were on the losing end...it was hell, the grenade launchers did not give us any peace..." He also mentions an explosion in which an officer and several men were killed at Bihar, and his hospitalization with jaundice. He is released and returns to the front in Italy in mid-July, 1944 to soon find himself surrounded by Americans. He is captured after only three days on the front, and makes a few entries while a P.O.W.: "For us the war is over...". The prisoner is eventually sent to a holding camp and then by ship to a P.O.W. camp, presumably in the U.S. Wons has also listed the many places he has served, and some personal notes in the back of the book. There is also a great deal of printed information within, including details on insignia, Waffenfarbe, the credo of the SS, etc. Very good. Shortly after his capture, thsi division was taken off the Gothic Line to fight Italian partisans - it soon participated in mass executions of hundreds of civilians.

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December 8, 2015 10:30 AM EST
Elkton, MD, US

Alexander Historical Auctions LLC

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