In 1919, the German War Graves Commision proposed a national day of mourning to remember the fallen of WWI. This day was called Volkstrauertag ("peoples day of mourning") and was first celebrated in 1922 with a remembrance ceremony in the German Parliament. It was held two Sundays before the first day of Advent, so usually in November.
When the Nazis came to power, they completely changed the meaning of the day, shifting towards hero worshipping instead of a sober remembrance ceremony. The day was made a national holiday, nig parades and rallies were held, and the day was instrumentalized for Nazi Propaganda. Its name was changed to Heldengedenktag ("Day of Commemoration of Heroes"), and it important dates were often held closely to it, for example, in 1936, German troops entered the Rhineland one day after this day.
In 1939, Hitler ordered the day to be celebrated on March 16th or the Sunday before March 16th, the day of re-introduction of conscription in 1936, removing any religious connection.
The day was held throughout the war, the last time on March 11th, 1945, were it was used one last time to urge people to continue fighting, despite the war situation already being hopelessly turned against Germany.
This video shows some raw color Propaganda footage from the Heldengedenktag 1944 held in Offenburg, a city in southwest Germany, close to the French border.
It shows as Wehrmacht parade, as well as the marching by of various NSDAP party organization, Hitler Youth etc.
It also shows what appears to be the swearing in of new recruits.
As this is raw, unprocessed footage, there is no sound or narration, and therefore no subtitles.
Remarks: As written above, this is raw camera footage, so there is no sound or narration. Back then, many cameras had no microphones, and sound would only be added later in the studio. This is also true for many Wochenschau issues.
00:19 I don’t know where exactly this is, but it looks like some kind of military barracks ground.
00:23 This officer is wearing his full parade uniform, which includes a white belt and all of his decorations. This was common on this day, as you will see later on this footage.
00:35 This is a delegation of WWI veterans. The officers in the brown uniform with the tricorne hat are WWI Africa veterans.
00:39 This is a delegation of various party officials, an RAD-officer and some civilian politicians.
00:50 This appears to be the swearing-in of new recruits.
01:01 This is a troop flag, the white color symbolizing infantry. Here is a link to a Wikimedia image showing how it looks: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1a/Heeresfahne_Infanterie.svg/323px-Heeresfahne_Infanterie.svg.png
01:29 The guns next to the podium are 3,7cm PaK 36, a light AT-gun.
01:53 While I’m not 100% sure, I believe the two flags on the left are old Imperial German army flags, possibly from WWI or even before, which were often flown/shown on Heldengedenktag.
03:02 The wreath-laying process for the fallen war deaths.
03:32 This is a unit of Hitler Youth boys.
03:48 This is a unit of Deutsches Jungvolk, recognizable by the single “S” rune. The Deutsches Jungvolk was the organization before the Hitler Youth, for boys aged 10-14 (Hitler Youth was for boys aged (14-18).
04:25 These are again various SS, Wehrmacht and Party Officials in their full-dress uniforms. The person on the far right is the Mayor of Offenburg, Wolfram Rombach (1897-1987), wearing the mayoral insignias.
04:34 I’m not sure what these flags are, but probably some kind of WWI veterans organization.
Source :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pewg9saKOMk
No comments:
Post a Comment