Soldbuch issued in 1941 to Höfeld He would serve on Destroyer Z30  Ships History: Z30 was one of fifteen Type 1936A destroyers built for the Kriegsmarine (German Navy) during World War II. Completed in 1941, the ship was transferred to Norwegian waters in early 1942 where she remained for most of the rest of her career, escorting convoys and laying minefields. She played a minor role in the indecisive Battle of the Barents Sea at the end of the year and was damaged during the raid on the island of Spitsbergen in September 1943. Z30 was crippled when she struck a mine in late 1944 and spent the rest of the war under repair. The ship was allocated to Great Britain after the war who used her to test the effects of underwater explosions. Upon their completion in 1948, Z30 was broken up for scrap. Decorated with the Destroyer Badge and EK2 for service on Z30. “On 5–8 September Z30, her sister Z29, and the destroyer Z4 Richard Beitzen laid a minefield in the Kara Strait between the island of Novaya Zemlya and Vaygach Island. Later that month, she participated in Operation Zarin, a minelaying mission off the coast of Novaya Zemlya from 24 to 28 September, together with Admiral Hipper, and her sisters Z23, Z28, and Z29. On 13–15 October, Z30, her sister Z27, Z4 Richard Beitzen and the destroyer Z16 Friedrich Eckoldt laid a minefield off the Kanin Peninsula at the mouth of the White Sea that sank the Soviet icebreaker Mikoyan. Three weeks later, the same four destroyers escorted Admiral Hipper as she attempted to intercept Allied merchant ships proceeding independently to Soviet ports in early November. They intercepted and sank the westbound Soviet oil tanker Donbass and the submarine chaser BO-78 on the 7th” Awards 3.11.1942 – Iron Cross Second Class 20.11.1942 – Destroyer Badge Seems he ended the war in a POW camp in Norway, Kaland. Then in France at Camp de Stetten June 1946. Rare to find a nice KM book like this with such a unique story. Hs Brother Kurts Death Notice was in the back of his Soldbuch. As well as his POW release papers and ticket home. Worthy of deeper research. 

Nicely marked original with some green paint left on the front. Marked H.K for Hermann Knoller. Tab is nicely marked also.  Price includes WW Tracked Shipping!

An interesting unit! Max Haussler, born in Ulm in 1889. He served in the First World War.  He was enlisted into the German Army in January of 1941.  He spent some time in Trier on duty, interestingly the role of these units can be seen below: During the Polish campaign, the Wehrmacht had already shown a lack of discipline on an unexpected scale. The reason for this was certainly that the army, including the officer corps, had grown too quickly and still lacked internal strength. As early as October 1939, Brauchitsch (commander of the army) reprimanded the deficiencies in the officer corps that had arisen during the short war against Poland in a decree: “illegal collections, including theft, embezzlement of looted goods, mistreatment of subordinates while completely drunk, disobedience, rape”. He spoke of “lansquenet manners that cannot be condemned harshly enough”. (<>Decree of the Ob.d.H. of 25.10.1939, printed in: Messerschmitt, M./Gersdorff, U.v. (ed.): Officers in images of documents from 3 centuries. (= Contributions to military and war history, 6), Stuttgart 1964. p. 277). In addition, the Wehrmacht was forced to call 1.2 million combatants of the First World War back to the flag during mobilization in 1939. These family fathers, well over 40 years old, showed little enthusiasm for war. Many of these soldiers were deployed in state rifle units in the rear of the front or in the divisions of the 3rd wave on the Upper Rhine front, and during the phase of the “seat war” up to spring 1940 there were repeated contacts with the French on the opposite side. In the area of ​​the HGr. C, the first cases of soldiers carrying their rifles with the muzzle pointing downwards became known at the end of October 1939. When front-line troops were transferred from the east to the west after the Polish campaign, transport wagons were decorated with slogans that fatally equated party divisions with the staging of the World War. For example, they said: “The front-line pig is here, where is the SS, where is the SA?” Such incidents, which were harmless in themselves, immediately triggered memories of revolting troops in November 1918 and caused considerable unrest among the political leadership of the regime, but also among the army leadership. Brauchitsch and Halder both compared the internal state of large parts of the army in autumn 1939 with signs of decay towards the end of the First World War. For example, the Chief of the Army General Staff noted in his diary at the beginning of November 1939: “Pictures like 17-18 are emerging.” <>(Halder, Franz: War Diary. Daily notes of the Chief of the Army General Staff 1939 – 1942. Vol. 1, Stuttgart 1962, p. 116.) The field gendarmerie, which was primarily intended to monitor military order and discipline, was only able to monitor soldiers to a limited extent due to its ties to large units and commands. Large areas of the German sphere of influence were also not covered by local commands (home war zone, parts of the occupied territories under civil administration), so that there was initially hardly any control here. In November 1939, these phenomena gave rise to the establishment of the army, air force and naval patrol services, which were combined on February 1, 1941 under the leadership of the OKW to form the “Wehrmacht patrol service”. The patrol units set up in 1940 as individual patrols or patrol companies of the respective command authorities were combined from 1941 onwards into army patrol groups (later Wehrmacht patrol groups) and train guard departments. The task of monitoring the behavior of individual soldiers in public was later replaced by the requirement to look after soldiers by setting up food stations, warming rooms, overnight accommodation, washrooms, etc. at rail junctions at home and in occupied territories, as well as at other locations where large concentrations of soldiers traveling alone suddenly appeared. To this end, the patrol services were then linked to the Wehrmacht travel agencies (transport offices, front control centers) and the mobile or stationary care facilities. The unit he was posted with also was:  Bahnhofs-Wach- u. Streifen-Abt. 108 Spent the winter of 1944/1945 in Bad Ems, their main task was the checking of Soldiers Soldbücher for holiday overstays etc. Entries in the Soldbuch:  Nice entries for, M43 Field Cap, Riders Boots, Peaked Visor Cap, and a Belgian Herstal Pistol in 7.65mm.  Entry on page 14, on the 16.4.1945 he was demobilised although this did not work when the allies got hold of him and he was arrested the same day!  Awarded the War Merit Cross with Swords in September of 1943.