Luftwaffe and Allied Air Forces Discussion Forum - Generalquartiermeister records

Hi, guys.

As we have been discusing this topic quite a bit lately, I wanted to show what I just answered in the rather long thread recently running on the board, as it ended up on page 5 or something... inbetween many unrelated and more or les personal messages:

Quote:

Hi, Rod

You are right in the assumprion that fragments from several different sources have survived. And the parts that survive are not consistently from the same source throughout the war.

Based on this I have in fact been able to identify which part of the system that generated the so-called summary loss lists. It is also of interest to note that some of the copies have additional comments and corrections, while others are missing these.

The explanation is straight forward, and I will illustrate this (and hopefully enlighten someone with regards to what these lists were used for... hint, hint ;-) ). The key is the Verteiler, or the distribution list, for the documents. These were not documents kept as a single copy in the vaults at RLM, but spread throughout the following units. I have bolded the copy that I have available:

1940:
Generalfeldmarschall (ie Göring)
Staatssekretär d.Luft. u. Gen.Insp.d.Lw.
Chef des Generalstabes
Lw.Führungsstab Ia op
Lw.Führungsstab Ic (Presse)
Generalquartiermeister
Generalluftzeugmeister
L.Wehr
Genst.Gen.Qu.6.Abt.(IB) (Entwurf)

1941:
Reichsmarschall (Copy 1)
Staatssekr.d.Luftf.u.Gen.Insp.d.Lw. (Copy 2)
Chef des Generalstabes (Copy 3)
Lw.Führungsstab Ia (Copy 4)
Lw.Führungsstab Ic (Presse) (Copy 5)
Generalquartiermeister (Copy 6)
Generalluftzeugmeister (Copy 7)
L.P.Chefabteilung (Copy 8. - 10.)
L.P. I/IV (Copy 11. - 12.)
L.D. (Copy 13.)
Chef für Flugsicherheit (Copy 14.)
L. E. 2 (Copy 15.)
Genst.Gen.Qu.2.Abt. (Copy 16.)
Genst.Gen.Qu.6.Abt. (IB, II, III) (Copy 17. - 19.)
Genst.Gen.Qu.6.Abt. (IC) (Entw. und Vorr.) (Copy 20. - 21.)

1943:
Reichsmarschall (Copy 1)
Staatssekr.d.Luftf.u.Gen.Insp.d.Lw. (Copy 2 sent to these two)
Generalluftzeugmeister (Copy 2 sent to these two)
Lw.Führungsstab Ia (Copy 3)
L.P.Chefabteilung (Copy 4. - 6.)
L.P. I/IV (Copy 7. - 8.)
Chef für Flugsicherheit (Copy 9.)
Chef Nachschub d.Lw. (2. Abt.) (Copy 10.)
Genst.Gen.Qu.6.Abt. (IB, III) (Copy 11. - 12.)
Genst.Gen.Qu.6.Abt. (IC) (Entwurf) (Copy 13.)

These are only examples, the full overview will be posted in my upcoming article on loss reporting.

What I do think is VERY important to note here is that these lists were in fact distributed, controlled and used as can be seen by the fact that especially the Personalamt or Central personnel office gave a lot of feedback with regards to information contained in them. The distribution includes both the units that were responsible for safety (Chef für Flugsicherheit), the ones responsible for reinforcements of personnel and aircraft (Chef Nachschub d.Lw.), the people in charge of phasing in and out and evaluating aircraft models (Generalluftzeugmeister), the personnel offices (L.P.Chefabteilung and L.P. I/IV) and of course the top ranks of the high command with Görings office at the top, as well as the operative high command of the Luftwaffe.

In my opinion this further underlines the important role these documents played in all aspects of 'running' the Luftwaffe during WWII.

My hope is that we in due time will be able to follow this paper trail, and maybe identify more of the missing parts in archives or collections around the world. I am convinced that fragments especially of the 1944 parts MUST exist in former Soviet archives, as these would have been
stored in different places spread out through Berlin. It is of course possible that all 13 to 14 copies that were distributed were destroyed, but for some reason I find this unlikely (or maybe I am just hoping). I hope that someone, sometime will pull out a large file from a dusty shelf or paper bag and say ' Hmmmm interesting, loss records for the Luftwaffe... maybe I should check if anyone is interested in these' or 'Hmmmm - this file must have been misplaced - let me put it back into the RL 2 III were it should be...'

Regards,
Andreas B