THE ERHARD MILCH COLLECTION: a unique look at the fascinating and yet chilling collection of medals and ephemera belonging to one of the more senior Nazi figures.

WHAT'S IN THIS ISSUE?

SMOKING OUT THE WASPS
To help counter RAF bombing attacks on Germany, the Luftwaffe set up a long-range night fighter organisation to patrol over Bomber Command bases searching for aircraft departing or returning from bombing raids as Chris Goss describes.

INTRUDER LOSS
Although the Luftwaffe night intruder operations over Britain achieved considerable success, there were also significant losses. Andy Saunders recounts the story of a Junkers 88 crew who vanished in 1941, their disappearance only being solved in 1978.

SOLDIER, HERO, PRISONER, SPY
For German soldiers captured at Stalingrad, the future in Soviet capacity a bleak. However, some sought better conditions by joining the pro-communist NKFD and Mark Khan tells the astonishing tale of a German officer who went on to spy for his captors.

THE STALINGRAD MYTHS
To mark the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Stalingrad, historian, and author Christer Bergström addresses many of the myths and misunderstandings that have persistently surrounded that epic battle across the subsequent decades.

FORGOTTEN SOLDIER
The book ‘The Forgotten Soldier’ by Guy Sajer became a classic when it was first published in France in 1967 and Douglas E. Nash investigates the intriguing story behind this somewhat enigmatic Franco-German soldier who served the Third Reich.

FUNERAL IN UMBRIA
When the two-man crew of a Messerschmitt Bf 110 died in a flying accident in Umbria during 1943, their funeral turned into an elaborate military and civic spectacle. As Andy Saunders discovers, this involved the whole town where they were buried.

DEEP TRAP U-BOAT CASUALTIES
When the British laid Deep Sea Mine Traps in Britain’s coastal waters during 1944, the initial assessment was that they had limited effect on the U-boats they were to counter. Now, marine archaeology has discovered the traps were more successful than first thought.

GERMANY’S AERO ENGINE DILEMMA
The Imperial German air services of the First World War were effectively let down by the nation’s aero engine manufacturing design and manufacturing capability and were condemned to lag behind their enemy as Jack Herris explains. 

THE MG 81
In our Notes from the Armoury series, we look at one of the Luftwaffe’s principal air-to-air defensive machine guns of the Second World War. An effective weapon, it largely replaced the MG 15 of the pre-war and early war period.

WAR ARTISTS - DRAWING THE WEHRMACHT
The work of war artist Josef Arens and his stunning drawings of the Wehrmacht during 1940 and 1941 are examined through the published wartime volume of his work which featured a published folio of forty pieces of his exceptional work.

EQUIPMENT IN COLOUR
In this occasional series, we feature for this issue the unusual Heinkel 162 A-2 Volksjäger ‘Salamander’ jet fighter in a stunning colourisation by R J Molloy of a captured aircraft displayed in London’s Hyde Park in 1945.

RESTORATION PROFILE - FIESLER Fi 103 REICHENBERG
One of the more unusual restorations of German Second World War military equipment undertaken for a British museum in recent years was that of the manned V-1 ‘Reichenburg’ flying bomb. Alex Bowers details the results of a remarkably bold preservation project.

STATE AWARDS
In our occasional series on the colourful, exotic, and often misunderstood German state awards of the First World War, the rare Lippe-Detmold Cross of Honour is featured in detail by our researcher Christophe Déruelle.

PHOTOS FROM THE FRONT
Our image for this issue is a colourisation by R J Molloy showing ships of Germany’s Grand Fleet at Wilhelmshaven early in the First World War. Despite its impressive nature, the fleet would ultimately see depletion at Jutland and later by scuttling at Scapa Flow.

WAR POSTERS
Although the war had effectively been lost for Germany by the time our featured poster was published, it nevertheless portrayed power through the figure of Paul von Hindeburg looming over a large artillery piece.

THE ERHARD MILCH COLLECTION
In our regular Orders, Medals, and Decorations feature, Dietrich Maerz gains privileged access to the medals, paperwork, and ephemera belonging to a senior Nazi – Generalfeldmarschall Erhard Milch. The collection is now owned by a private collector in the United States and can be regarded as truly unique, containing many remarkable and bizarre objects. The collection is both fascinating and chilling at the same time, give Milch’s close association with the Nazi leadership and the Holocaust.