Postal System of Nazi Germany

Discussions on Axis documents, postcards, posters and other paper items as well as feldpost numbers.
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Kim Sung
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Postal System of Nazi Germany

#1

Post by Kim Sung » 17 Jan 2007, 08:06

I have some questions on the German postal system.

1. How many days on the average did a letter from the front (for example, Stalingrad or Norway) arrive at a sender's home?

2. What kind of censor system did the Germans run?

3. How many postal offices did the Germans run outside Germany?

4. How many German personels worked in the field of postal system?


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Matt Gibbs
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#2

Post by Matt Gibbs » 27 Jan 2007, 15:29

The german Postal administration very quickly took over the postal system of all occupied territories, for example the overprints for some stamps issued after the takeover and creation of the Generalgouvenment and Bohemia/Moravia were within days and weeks of the end of hostilities. The post is always needed!
The number of postal workers is harder to estimate but must have run into hundreds of thousands.
I collect the stamps from this era but am not clued up on this so much.
The germans ran official civilian censorship of mail going to outside territories but not internal mail as far as I am aware. Letters from France to Krakow might be censored but not internally in Germany, say from Essen to Berlin.
Mail outgoing from the forces was often censored and was as far as I know, done by the military before the mail was passed onto the civilian delivery system.
Post offices continued to work right up until the end. I have mail in my collection franked in March 1945, but have not yet got any from later but I have seen it. Some people collect these type of envelopes. I would love to find one from May 1945, but these are sometimes faked, a registered cover would be best! ;)
Regards
Matt


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Vikki
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#3

Post by Vikki » 31 Jan 2007, 00:36

I thought you might be interested in what a censored letter looked like when (if) it arrived at its destination.

I have several envelopes in my collection with the Geöffnet stickers showing that they'd been opened by German censors. I'd always wondered what the authorities did if they found sensitive information in a letter: Did they cut out the militarily sensitive parts, or confiscate the whole letter? About a year ago, I found this example with the letter still enclosed, sent from occupied Norway to the United States. The censors seem to have simply painted over the offending parts with very heavy paint. Better than cutting them out with a razor, I guess, which is what I'd imagined.....

Best,
~Vikki
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Dieter Zinke
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#4

Post by Dieter Zinke » 01 Feb 2007, 15:50

Some examples (my own collection):

A registered letter (mailed 20.10.42 and arrived 21.10.42 according postmark).

A censored letter from USA in october 1939

A postcard with debasement per automatical private postmark (an early german example)

A military postal service: "Zurück an Absender" (to return to sender), "Empfänger im Lazarett" (addressee in the hospital)

Dieter Zinke
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Marcus
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#5

Post by Marcus » 01 Feb 2007, 20:57

Interesting photos, thanks.

/Marcus

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Vikki
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#6

Post by Vikki » 02 Feb 2007, 06:38

Dieter,

An Official, and Registered, letter....that also appears to be Feldpost marked? Unusual...Nice!

I also love the double-censored cover! I have a couple of just postwar British and American-censored pieces to Germany. It's interesting to see one that was censored both going and coming!



Marcus,

Can you tell why my Norwegian letter was censored? I can post the other pages (1 & 3 ) if that will help.

Best,
~Vikki

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Dieter Zinke
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#7

Post by Dieter Zinke » 02 Feb 2007, 11:31

Vikki wrote:...Can you tell why my Norwegian letter was censored? ....
Vikki,
I think this was an usual procedure in the occupied countries, see my following example from Denmark (27.08.1942).

I want to post also other examples

Dieter
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Vikki
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#8

Post by Vikki » 03 Feb 2007, 21:10

Dieter,

You're right, it was usual for them to open and check mail in the occupied countries. But what I was curious about was whether Marcus or anyone else could tell what the Censors found it necessary to black out in this particular letter, from the context of the rest of the letter.

By the way, great covers and card!

Best,
~Vikki

robban64
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Re: Postal System of Nazi Germany

#9

Post by robban64 » 04 Aug 2009, 19:24

Hi

I collect German Feldpost from januari 1945 to the bitter end.
It's very hard to find envelopes from april-may as mentoned earlier in this thread.

I got one from 2/5 -45.
From Res.Lazarett.1.Budweis Abt.1 Böhmen Mähren

Please visit my homepage.It's i swedish but you will find many covers from 1945.

http://www.123minsida.se/tyskfeldpost

Robert
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