German POWs in Australia

[nobodyofnote]

Max, do you know if any photographs exist of Erich Puschnus?

[Dachhase]

The plot thickens. He was born in 1909, and arrived in Australia in 1930. Officially, Germany did not have an air force between 1918 (when he was nine) and 1936. There is no available record showing that Puschnus left Australia between 1930 and 1936 (although records are not complete and infallible), so when did he serve in any air force? (Lithuanian? The RAAF is very unlikely!) This affair looks like a bureaucratic bungle. I reported this to the Defence Attaché at the German Embassy in Canberra something like 25 years ago, but no action was taken.
nobodyofnote: There do not seem to be any photos in official records. Photos of WW1 internees are available in Archives, but not the individual mug shots of WW2 POW and internees. Some group photos are available at the War Museum research centre in Canberra, but these were taken only at the request of the internees concerned. If he had nobody to whom he wanted to send a photo, he would not have had one taken, as they had to pay for these.
A thought has occurred to me: since he asked to have his internment registered with the German Government, he might have been receiving the "Reichsgeld" allotment. However, in order to obtain this the internee had to affirm his allegiance to Germany and declare that he would return to Germany if an opportunity for repatriation arose. In any case, I do not know if these records still exist in Germany, and they are available in Australia for only some of the compounds, and difficult to find. They are not filed logically.

[nobodyofnote]

It's possible there was somehow a paperwork mix up with Werner Junghanns, who also died at Tatura, and co-incidentally was an Oberleutnant in the Luftwaffe.

[Dachhase]

If I remember correctly, Junghanns has his own grave at Tatura, so that would have to be a duplication.

[Max]

nobodyofnote: There do not seem to be any photos in official records. Photos of WW1 internees are available in Archives, but not the individual mug shots of WW2 POW and internees. Some group photos are available at the War Museum research centre in Canberra, but these were taken only at the request of the internees concerned.
.

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collection ... ura+camp+1
This is a link to the archive of photos taken at Tatura Camp 1 [300+ images]
Puschnus is not identified in any of them as far as I can tell, but many images of groups of internees have no individual identifications at all.
He may well be in there somewhere.
I suppose that any indentifications that are recorded have been made public, but it may be worth asking the question.

Life seemed to be fairly comfortable in the camps.
I once saw a quote, as follows. [more or less]
The barbed wire was gold plated but it was still barbed wire.
Max

[Max]

An interesting piece on WW2 German Prisoners of War in Australia
http://www.navyhistory.org.au/german-pr ... ralia-ww2/

[Max]

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collection ... mit=Search
The photo archive for Dhurringile pow camp [13] for German [and Italian] officers.
As you will see in some shots, Dhurringile was a once grand mansion.
Again , not many names.
Note that other ranks were held at camp 13 [ Murchison] and Camp 6 about 10 Km to the south.

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collection ... mit=Search

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collection ... +murchison

[nobodyofnote]

Thanks Max & Dachhase, there is some interesting photos on the Museum Victoria website.

http://museumvictoria.com.au/collections/



Source: http://museumvictoria.com.au/collection ... circa-1942

It doesn't state whose funeral this is:

"German naval and Afrika Korps officer prisoners of war at a funeral ceremony, Tatura, Victoria circa 1942. A swastika and an iron cross are visible on two of the wreaths. The naval officer in the peaked cap with white cover is believed to be Fregattenkapitan Theodor Detmers, former commander of the German auxiliary cruiser Kormoran which sank the RAN light cruiser HMAS Sydney off the Western Australian coast on 19 November 1941. The other naval officer (third from right) is believed to be Oberleutnant zur See Joachim Greter, Kormoran's torpedo officer."



Source: http://museumvictoria.com.au/collection ... circa-1944

Or this (dated on the page as 'circa 1944', but it appears to be the same funeral ceremony as above):

"A funeral for a German prisoner of war at Tatura. The coffin is being carried into a cemetery by German Africa Korps prisoners. No. 13 Prisoner of War Group was located at Murchison, Victoria."

[Dachhase]

I am fairly sure that it is the funeral of Tobias Tschurtschenthaler. The senior naval officer is indeed Detmers. I don't think that the other naval man is Greter, but I am not sure. I would expect it to be the senior Petty Officer in that compound - either Kohls or Köhn, depending on the date. I would have to check. (I cannot see the rank markings clearly enough to be sure of this.) One of the Afrika-Korps men would certainly be Sergeant-Major Rudolf Liessmann; I think that he is second from the right. One of the doctors would have been present, and the others were probably just from the same hut as TT, and would be difficult to identify. Is it possible to enlarge these photos for viewing? I have left-clicked, right-clicked and double-clicked to no effect.
RE the photos in the link given by Max: they are all civil internees. [INSERT: Sorry: I was in haste to cook dinner, and I overlooked the link for the POW photos. I'll have to take time to check.]
I have compiled basic records for local internees, giving usually date and place of birth, date of internment and release, date of arrival in Australia (at which port and by which ship), marital status, children, military service, NSDAP and / or Arbeitsfront and / or Frauenschaft number and date of joining, if applicable; also any Party rank (e.g. Ortsgruppenleiter); also their employment (e.g. Dychem, Auto-Union, Hapag, NDL).
If Marcus & Co. think it is worthwhile, I could transfer these to Forum, but it would not be a quick job. With the time that I have available to do this, it could extend over a few months, as the material would have to be checked and the format altered. It would run into some 30 pages and would probably be best on a site of its own. I am not seeking to make work for myself, so I shall do this only if it is really wanted, and I shall not be offended if it is rejected.

[nobodyofnote]

Is it possible to enlarge these photos for viewing? I have left-clicked, right-clicked and double-clicked to no effect.

If you go to the original source link and click on the photo there, you should get a slightly larger image in a pop-up window.

[Dachhase]

Thanks. Doesn't help much. It needs somebody with a better instinctive knowledge of what badges were worn where, even when you can't see what they look like, somebody who also has better eyesight. Liessmann would absolutely have had to be there, but on closer examination I think he was probably not the man second from the right.

[Max]

There were three burials in 1942, all at Murchison cemetery.
Robert Schepler 12/07/1942
Tobias Tschurtschenthaler 22/09/1942
Adolf Heintz 13/12/1942

The photos could be any one or two of them.

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collection ... mit=Search
There are three photos tagged Tschurtschenthaler



Note the salute by Australian military personal.



Tschurtschenthaler was of course, later reburied at the German Military Cemetery at Tatura.

Was TT the prisoner shot by guards during a riot?

Spelling edits

[Max]

Today I discovered that the Tatura Museum does indeed know about the mistake on Puschnus' bronze plaque.
It is mentioned in their pamphlet on the war graves cemetery.
Also according to the records of the Tatura Cemetery Trust there was no mention of any rank when he was first buried there.
The mistake may therefore have been made by the German embassy[?] in Canberra at the time of the reburial in November 1957.

[Dachhase]

TT: Yes, he was the man shot in the so-called riot.
Looking again at the photos, I am not sure that the two sets are of the same funeral. I am reasonably certain that the man in the overcoat in the second group, back to camera, is Liessmann, and I don't see anyone in an overcoat in the first two photos. The season looks wrong, although the trees around the cemetery would not change much with the seasons.
Good work getting that pamphlet, Max.

[Adam Carr]

These photos raise again the question that I asked in my first post in this thread. All the German uniforms are immaculate, complete with insignia and decorations, while every photo I have seen of Allied POWs in German camps shows them wearing a rag-tag of bits of uniform combined with any old thing they could get. There must be a reason for this. Was it to do with the custodial policies of the Germans v the Allies, or was it a cultural difference between German and Allied POWs?