Photos Colour and Colourised Photos of WW2 & earlier conflicts

[Redav]

“Return after combat,” read the note on the back of these two pictures. The exhausted face and damp hair show that, as always, it had been a matter of life or death.
Summer 1940.

(The pilot, Gustav “Micky” Sprick, achieved nine victories during the Battle of Britain. He was killed in June 1941 when the right wing of his aircraft broke off during a dogfight with Royal Air Force fighters over France.)

 

[BravoZulu]

Battle of the Scarpe. 29 August 1918
Daylight patrol of the 6th Battalion, Seaforth Highlanders working forward towards Hausa and Delbar Woods. North-east of Roeux, Troops leaving their trench.

Stretcher-bearers (SB) of the 6th Battalion, Seaforth Highlanders asleep. Near Roeux.

 

[BravoZulu]

Château-Thierry, France was liberated on August 28, 1944, by men of the 7th Armored Division who advanced from the village of Montmirail in the south and entered Château-Thierry by the street "Avenue de Montmirail".

 

[BravoZulu]

2nd Battle of Arras. A horse drawn ambulance of the 2/3rd London Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps and a Mk IV (female) tank "Lucretia II" Nº6012 L48 of 11 Section, 'C' Company, 12th Battalion abandoned after gas attacks of 24th August 1918, at the crossroads at Croisilles, Pas-de-Calais.
The 7th Division attacked Croisilles in March 1917 and took it on 2 April. It was lost on 21 March 1918 and recaptured by the 56th (London) Division on the following 28 August, after heavy fighting. (Photo taken 13 September 1918)

 

[Redav]

10th October 1941.

Infantry of the Italian Expeditionary Corps (Corpo di Spedizione Italiano in Russia, CSIR). / Soldiers of the 52nd Infantry Division "Torino" / on the streets of the Nazi-occupied Russian city of Stalino (now Donetsk).

The CSIR Corps was sent by Benito Mussolini to help the Third Reich in its invasion of the USSR

 

[Redav]

**The Man Who Was Sentenced to Death by Both Hitler and Stalin**

This colorized historical image depicts General** der Artillerie Walter von Seydlitz-Kurzbach**. From 1940 to 1942, Seydlitz-Kurzbach commanded the 12th Infantry Division and played a major role in the Wehrmacht's breakthrough from the Soviet encirclement at Demjansk.

In the Battle of Stalingrad, he was one of the highest-ranking German officers who insisted on breaking through the enemy encirclement despite blatantly disobeying Hitler's orders.

When Friedrich Paulus dismissed him, Seydlitz-Kurzbach** fled with several German officers amidst a hail of bullets from his own side**! Along with 90,000 of his starving comrades, Seydlitz marched off into Soviet captivity in February 1943 and soon became their most loyal collaborator, becoming a member of the Nationalkomitee Freies Deutschland, an anti-Nazi organization whose members were drawn from German prisoners of war in Soviet camps. Fellow generals denounced him as a traitor and a coward, and Hitler condemned him to death in absentia. The Soviets kept him in prison after 1945, and in 1950, Stalin, too, had him condemned to death, a sentence later commuted.

Ironically, after the war, he was indicted by his new Soviet masters for alleged war crimes against Russian prisoners while serving as a Wehrmacht general. The photo above was taken shortly after Seydlitz-Kurzbach surrendered, where he is wearing a thick *Russian ushanka fur hat *and is not wearing any World War II-era medals.

 

[Redav]

Red Army Officer to 3rd Reich Commander

Ivan Nikitich Kononov was a Red Army major who defected to Nazi Germany in August 1941 to command a prominent Cossack collaborationist force before escaping to Australia after World War II. Born in 1900 in Novoazovsk into a Cossack family. Bolsheviks executed his father, brother, and father-in-law during de-Cossackization. He concealed his background, joined the Communist Party, and graduated from the Frunze Military Academy. He rose to major and commanded the Red Army's 436th Rifle Regiment. He surrendered to German troops near Mogilev on August 22, 1941. Citing deep hatred for Joseph Stalin, he offered intelligence and proposed forming an anti-Soviet unit. He was convicted of high treason in absentia by a Soviet military tribunal. Authorized by Germany to recruit Soviet prisoners of war into a Cossack auxiliary unit, they fought in brutal rear-security and anti-partisan campaigns in occupied Belarus (1942–1943). Integrated into the German 1st Cossack Division and deployed to Yugoslavia in 1943. Kononov evaded the forced repatriation of Cossacks to the USSR by escaping to the American occupation zone in Germany. He immigrated to Australia under an assumed identity, where he lived until his death in 1967.

 

[Redav]

When Adolf Hitler wore a white jacket or tunic, it simply meant he was wearing his formal summer service dress uniform for warm-weather or high-status civilian/diplomatic receptions. Like many military and political organizations of the era, the Nazi Party (NSDAP) and German armed forces authorized a lightweight white summer tunic for wear during the warmer months (typically between April and September). Hitler wore his double-breasted white tunic primarily during the mid-to-late 1930s for formal daytime diplomatic receptions, high-profile ceremonies, and hosting foreign dignitaries at his alpine retreat, the Berghof.
Photographs of Hitler in white attire are relatively rare because the outfit was strictly a peacetime and diplomatic fashion statement. Following his final formal portrait session in white at the Berghof in July 1939 (just weeks before the invasion of Poland), Hitler permanently stopped wearing the white summer tunic once World War II commenced, switching exclusively to field-grey or standard dark political uniforms.
This portrait was captured during a photo session at the Berghof, Hitler's mountain residence in Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden in 1938.
Images from these sessions were carefully manufactured as peacetime propaganda by the Nazi regime shortly before the outbreak of World War II.

 

[santana]

1 September 1944
British Infantry of the 5th. Coldstream Guards patrol through Arras, France.
Sgt Phil Roland Wilkin's daughter has identified her father as being *3rd in line* with the Mk lll Sten gun, second man in line is GDSM Ernest Goodman, fourth man in line is GDSM Archie Newman.

 

[Conhoon]

German Deutschland-class battleships Schleswig-Holstein during the bombardment of Westerplatte, Poland, 1 September 1939.

 

[NebrHogger]

10th October 1941.

Infantry of the Italian Expeditionary Corps (Corpo di Spedizione Italiano in Russia, CSIR). / Soldiers of the 52nd Infantry Division "Torino" / on the streets of the Nazi-occupied Russian city of Stalino (now Donetsk).

The CSIR Corps was sent by Benito Mussolini to help the Third Reich in its invasion of the USSRView attachment 575379

The Russian incursion would not end well for these Italian troops. Mussolini didn't want to "help"
as much as he wanted to share in the spoils... of which were almost none.

 

[Redav]

The Blohm & Voss BV-238 was an enormous six-engined German flying boat developed during World War II. First flown in April 1944, it held the distinction of being the heaviest aircraft ever built at the time and was the largest physical aircraft produced by any Axis power during the war.

Built by the Blohm & Voss shipbuilding company in Hamburg, the aircraft was structured with a highly compartmentalized, ship-like hull design to survive severe combat damage. It was intended for long-range maritime patrol, transport, and bombing missions. It featured two internal decks and wing tunnels that allowed the crew to access outer gunner stations.

Despite its advanced engineering and stable flight characteristics, the deteriorating strategic situation for Germany late in the war prevented it from ever entering mass production or seeing combat. Only a single functional prototype (BV 238 V1) was completed.

In September 1944, while camouflaged and moored on Lake Schaal (Schaalsee), the sole flying prototype was spotted, strafed, and partially sunk by Allied aircraft. After the war, the wreckage was fully scuttled in the deeper parts of the lake by British forces in 1947.

 

[Redav]

This photograph of German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel drinking water from a glass alongside Italian officer General Scotti, was taken in 1942. The image was captured during the intense heat of the North African desert campaign in Egypt, specifically around July or August 1942 during the first Battle of El Alamein.

 

[Redav]

The photographs depict the "Green Devils" (German: Grüne Teufel) as a colloquial nickname given by Allied soldiers to the elite German airborne troops, the Fallschirmjäger. They were the vanguard of the Wehrmacht (formally subordinate to the Luftwaffe) and were among the most challenging opponents on the front lines of World War II. The name referred directly to the distinctive, green camouflage, sleeveless jumpsuits (known as Knochensack – "bone bag") that paratroopers wore over their uniforms during jumps.

The Allies nicknamed them "devils" for their fanatical resistance, high morale, aggressive small-unit tactics, and exceptional defensive effectiveness. They were well-armed and trained.

 

[Connaught Ranger]

View attachment 575776View attachment 575777
The photographs depict the "Green Devils" (German: Grüne Teufel) as a colloquial nickname given by Allied soldiers to the elite German airborne troops, the Fallschirmjäger. They were the vanguard of the Wehrmacht (formally subordinate to the Luftwaffe) and were among the most challenging opponents on the front lines of World War II. The name referred directly to the distinctive, green camouflage, sleeveless jumpsuits (known as Knochensack – "bone bag") that paratroopers wore over their uniforms during jumps.

The Allies nicknamed them "devils" for their fanatical resistance, high morale, aggressive small-unit tactics, and exceptional defensive effectiveness. They were well-armed and trained.

The para smocks had sleeves, no legs.

 

[Redav]

62K views · 1.3K reactions | USN / RN Battleships enter Tokyo Bay - August 1945 - NARA #usnavy #royalnavy #WW2 | World War Pictures

USN / RN Battleships enter Tokyo Bay - August 1945 - NARA #usnavy #royalnavy #WW2

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[Redav]

The German auxiliary cruiser Atlantis, under the command of Bernhard Rogge, carried out a long raiding voyage during World War II disguised as a merchant ship.

Departing Germany in March 1940, the ship sailed the Atlantic, Indian Ocean, and Pacific under various flags and identities. Over the course of this voyage, which lasted approximately 602 days, it traveled more than 100,000 miles and sank or captured 22 Allied merchant ships. Their total tonnage ranged between approximately 144,000 and 146,000 gross tons. With this record, Atlantis completed the longest voyage of any German raider and was also one of the most successful in terms of tonnage.

Rogge would approach his targets disguised as a merchant vessel as much as possible, then reveal the ship’s weapons. The crews taken prisoner were generally treated humanely, with reasonable provisions for food and shelter. This conduct was later spoken of positively by some of the captains whose ships had been sunk. Atlantis was intercepted and sunk on November 22, 1941 in the South Atlantic by the British heavy cruiser HMS Devonshire. Most of the crew was rescued by German submarines.

After the war, Rogge was not arrested by the Allies due to his command style aboard Atlantis. He later served in the newly established West German Navy with the rank of Rear Admiral.

 

[Redav]

Weary German soldiers crash out and face withdrawal symptoms after prolonged use of Pervitin during the French campaign.

France, May 1940.

Between April and July of 1940, the Wehrmacht received over 35,000,000 Pervitin or Methamphetamine pills.

Pervitin made German soldiers able to fight longer and harder than their enemy, but also caused a lot of health problems.

German commanders often suffered heart attacks after being awake for multiple days. Most of them took multiple Pervitin pills a day.

 

[Redav]

A woman posting a letter in a postbox amongst destroyed buildings and rubble caused by German air raids during World War II. Photograph taken in London, United Kingdom in 1940.

 

[Redav]

Hello Boys.. On September 3, 1945, in North-East Germany, north of Spitsbergen, members of a meteorological expedition led by Wilhelm Dege capitulated, becoming the last German unit of World War II to surrender. Wilhelm Dege (1910–1979) was a German geographer, polar explorer, and educator who earned his place in history as the commander of the last Wehrmacht unit to surrender during World War II. His mission in the High North is steeped in many remarkable events.

Hitler's Last Soldiers

The most incredible moment in this story comes in May 1945. Berlin falls, the Third Reich signs an unconditional surrender, the world celebrates the end of the war in Europe... and yet the "Haudegen" crew remains trapped in the Arctic ice, reliably transmitting weather reports. Why? Because no one remembered them, and their radio codes were no longer received by the now-defunct command.

(I thought they were the cast of THE THING )