The "Party Day of Peace"

An Award for the Rally that never was.

Pictured with this article is one of the more unusual award medallions prepared by theThird Reich. It was never given to anyone. It celebrated a non-event.

This slver medallion weighs 7 ounces and is 9.5 cm in diameter. (Don't confuse this piece with the ''tinnys'' of similar design). It was found in a black, hinged case with gray velveteen interior and labeled ''Carl Poellath, Schrobenhausen''. Professor Klein's (the designer) trademark ''RK'' can be seen on the medallion just above the ankle of the reclining female fgure. This piece is now in my collection.

The story of the Nazi Party Rallies in Nuremberg has captured the imagination of all who witnessed them, and generations later, of those who read about them and experienced contemporarily footage including the classic ''Triumph of the Will''.

Each year in Nuremberg, for about ten days, tens of thousands of Nazi Party faithful gathered for a combination sports fest, Heer and Luftwaffe maneuvers and motivationional session, all rolled into one. The blood-red, white and black flags by the thousands, the martial music, the uniforms of practically everyone involved, left all present in a grand state of euphoria precisely the effect desired by Hitler and his comrades. Nine hundred and fifty thousand of Hitler's followers attended the 1938 Party Rally. They expected almost two million for 1939, the rally titled ''The Party Day of Peace''. It was scheduled to begin on September the second, and was to be a truly grand rally. By early August 2,500 participants had set out on an ''Adolf Hitler March'' to attend the rally. All summer thousands of laborers worked on the grounds, finishing a new concert hall and completing a wide avenue linking the Luitpold Arena and the Marzfeld to the great stadium.

Five large restaurants had been set up to feed the workers. According to the VOLKISCHERBEOBACHTER of August 15, 1939, a special force of 26,000 SS men had been delegated to keep order, help with traffic, and keep everyone in line.

More than a thouand streecar conductors were yanked from their jobs in Vienna, Hamburg, Berlin and Breslau to run the special streetcar lines in Nurmberg - they even went underground near the rally area. Four hundred flags were made, each bearing the heraldic figure of the city of Greater Germany.

In late August, special camp for a least 350,000 visitors were set up. Workers built a special train station and opened twenty-eight special post offices.

It could all have been happening on the moon, because just a little more than 500 kilomiters away World War II was about to start on September first.

In Nuremberg, however, everything was ready. But with only 6 day to go, the German news bureau abruptly announced: ''According to the press office of the NSDAP, the planned party rally from September 2 to 11 this year will not take place. Whether the meeting will be held later depends on political circumstances.

They folded the flags, struck the tents and as the streetcars stood silent Hitler crashed across the border into Poland. So much for the "Day of Peace".

The Nuremberg one sees on the films and in the pictures looks quite different today. The Luitpold hall and field were destroyed by Allied bombs; only the memorial to war dead survived and still looks almost exactly as it did when Hitler and his colleagues stood in front of its central flame and saluted. When you stand in the remaining field, as I did last year, you become disoriented, as most of the pictured landmarks are gone. The Luitpoldhain its most famous picture perhaps for the Standartenweihe) is only a smallish park, surrounded by shrubs and trees. In recent years, to help the confused visitor, a signboard has been erected near the site of the Luitpold hall (and those tall flags) explaining what happened there and orienting the viewer with a large map of the entire Party Rally area as it was in the 1930's.

The familiar Zeppelinwiese, of course, was changed at the end of the war. The long columns atop the stands were destroyed, along with the huge swastikas on top, leaving only the seating area and the reviewing stand. All are in poor condition. When I was there last year there were soft drink cans and trash lettering the stands. A schoolmaster stood where Hitler once reviewed his troops and instructed a class of about 30 high students, who were seated in the stands, on the history of the area. I stood for about 3o minutes listening in awe to his frankness. He pulled no punches. Where tanks had rumbled on the field fifty-five years earlier, several simi-trailers practiced parking between red pylons.

If you can and one of these medallions, obtain it if you can, as you will own a particularly unique item. It was designed by Professor Richard Klein and was produced in gold, silver and bronze and would have been awarded in the sports competition. As things turned out, it was never awarded to anyone.

Mickey Huffman, "The 'Party Day of Peace' ", Der Gauleiter, 1991

Collecting Gau Badges

The Nazi Party administration was divided into four levels, Reich (National), Gau (State, Region or Province), Kreis (District) and so on through Orts, Zelle and Block. Every year each Gau would hold a ''Gautag'' or, you might say, Province Day. This was like a small version of the National Reichsparteitag. There were lots of speeches, parades, meetings and more speeches. To help pay the cost of holding the event, and to generally fatten the Party coffers, it was common practice to create a badge commemorating the day and sell them for a small amount to visitors. The badges were bought by virtually everyone attending and were worn during the day to show support for the party. At the end of the day many people kept the badges as a remembrance. Today collectors commonly refer to these type badges as tinnys.

Unlike the Reichsparteitag badges of which you can find only about 10 different, Gautag badges are varied and many. Some simple arithmetic will give you an idea. There were 43 Gau, and from 1933 to 1939 they each created a yearly Gautag badge, that would be 301 different badges. Some Gau created badges earlier than 1933 and some may have started later, I don't think there is any complete record. Suffice it to say there are several hundred different.

These badges offer some interesting collecting challcnges. A collector could decade to acquire one of each. This would be difficult because some would prove to be scarce or impossible to acquire and because of the lack of documentation he would never really know when he had them all. Another way of doing it would be to collect only certain Gaus or specific years, such as the last year of issue (which in most cases would be 1938 or 1939, as donation badges or all types were seldom struck during the war). One idea that I think would be interesting, would be to frame a large map of Germany showing all the Gaus and to get one badge from each Gau and affixit to the proper location on the map. Other collections could be built by acquiring only those made with certain design features (like eagles), only those made of tin, ceramic, plastic,l eather or whatever. The possibilities are endless.

Which ever way a collector decides to approach it building this type of collection can have several advantages. First: these badges are readily available and several different ones can usually be found at any militaria show. Second: there are so many different ones that the problem of not being able to add something new to the collection would not come up for quite a while. Third: most Gautag badges are relatively inexpensive. Unlike collecting medals or combat badges, which quickly requires you to spend hundreds or thousands for each new piece. Gautag badges are usually priced from ten dollars to less than one hundred dollars each, with (I would estimate) an average price of about twenty-five to fifty dollars. Finally when you get a good collection of Gautag badges you can start collecting Kreistag badges. I figure there should be at least 6,000 different ones of those.

Bob Treend, "Collecting Gau Badges", Der Gauleiter, 1991

The Braunschweig Badge

One of the more "common" badges of the political genre of the Third Reich is the SA TREFFEN BADGE for Braunschweig. Yet it was one of the most honored... a "Party Decoration" ranked right up there with the Blood Order and the Coburg Badge. But whereas the Coburg Badge had only 400 issued, there were over 100,000 Braunschweig badges awarded. Where did they all go?

They are not where you think they are! More on that statement later.

What happened in Braunschweig to make Hitler value the date so much? It was this: On October 18,1931, the SA in public gave its unqualified support to Hitler, and despite earlier revolts by certain elements in the previous months, never again wavered from that loyalty (the Rohm bloody weekend notwithstanding).

For a time in 1930, it looked highly unlikely that there would be an SA rally in Braunschweig to pay homage to Hitler.

With industrialists money he had acquired in 1929, Hitler re-equipped and enlarged his SA. He bought the famous Brown House in Munich on the Briennerstrasse, which he had redesigned as Party Headquarters. Inside it was stunningly impressive, at least by Nazi standards. The conference room was garish red leather and the black and red entrance

The hall was highlighted with swastikas. Needless to say, the SA man from the country who stumbled into "his" Party Headquarters came away very impressed! But also possibly very depressed, because many of the SA were in dire straits.

While Hitler was decorating the Brown House, the situation was changing rapidly. On March 27, 1930 the Muller coalition resigned and Henrich Bruning, head of the Catholic Centre Party, succeeded him and promised to cure the economic problems of inflation and unemployment, but the Nazis and Communists voted against it in the Reichstag. When his partners refused to vote with him, he dissolved the Reichstag and called for new elections for September 14th.

Ernst Rohm, Hitler's long-time ally, was in Bolivia assisting that country in training its army. The SA, back in Germany, was exhausted from non-stop campaigning and "getting nowhere fast", to use a current descriptive phrase. The SA men were unpaid, hungry, many beginning to literally starve. So the districts under Oberster SA-Fuhrer Ost, Walther Stennes, went on strike. Hitler raced from Munich to Berlin, because if the revolt continued, or spread, all would be lost in the September elections. Hitler went from group to group, begging, pleading, even sobbing... men were angry, frustrated and, hard to believe today, one SA-Fuhrer actually grabbed Hitler and shook him!

But Hitler quieted the men. He determined Rohm was the one man who could corral the uneasy SA and decided to call him back.

In the meantime, he quietly took a step (totally unnoticed by the outside world) which assured his ultimate control of the SA. He named himself Oberster SA-Fuhrer on September 2, with second in command to be the Stabschef answerable only to him.

Meanwhile there were the elections. Thirty million Germans went to the polls in September, 1930 and startled the world by making the Nazis the second largest party in the Reichstag with 107 seats. A total of 6,409,000 votes were cast for the Nazis. This was heady stuff for Hitler, who was pursuing his personal goal with a vengeance. The SA was venting its fury... it wanted a bloody revolution, fiot legal maneuvering, and it wanted the revolution now. Under those circumstances Rohm returned as Chief of Staff of the SA on January 5,1931, answerable only to Hitler.

Stennes wasn't through; he continued to fight for economic aid to the SA men in Group Ost, but it was a losing battle... he read in the paper that he had been deposed.

Hitler knew he needed Rohm and Rohm knew he needed Hitler. Goebbles and Goring felt threatened by Rohm's position next to Hitler and cleverly acquired some "love letters" the homosexual Rohm had written, and had them published in the newspapers. Rohm could have been impaled by the events, but he wasn't. Hitler came to his rescue with a statement that included these words, "the SA is not a moral institution for the education of well-to-do-daughters, but an association of rough fighters".

And so, on to Braunschweig. There, just 10 months after Rohm's return, Hitler received the salute of more than 100,000 loyal followers. He seemed to sense that this was the "true beginning" of his awesome power.

Braunschweig (Brunswick) was a town of 100,000, about 40 miles east of Hannover (about 150 miles west of Berlin). Today it has a population of about 275,000 and is just inside the West German border. One of the most famous pictures from the pre-war era is on the front cover of one volume of the TimeLife series on World War II, this one titled "The Nazis", and shows Hitler taking the salute of the marching SA troops in Braunschweig.

And now we come to the strange case of the badge itself. It comes in two variations (Type A and Type B). Type A measures 37mm by 50mm; Type B measures 37mm by 52mm. The badge consists of an eagle standing on a wreath which encirces a swastika and the words "SA TREFFEN BRAUNSCHWEIG 17/18 OKTOBER 1931".

Both badges were originally available as tinnies or "donation badges" sold at the rally...that's how the SA raised money. Then, when Hitler named the badge as one of the top "Party Decorations" of pride. Type B was recast as a solid badge.

But what happened to all these badges? The ones you usually see on dealer's tables are unfortunately not original. The original badge was finely detailed, even as a tinnie. I have discussed these badges with noted collectors at length. One internationally recognized German collector knows of only five (!) of the Type A in private collections and has never (repeat NEVER) seen a real Type A badge on a table at any show, anywhere!

Type B, the oval badge, is occasionally seen, usually the solid version, but usually not real. All one has to do is compare an original with its fine detail to the badges you find on tables at shows to see the difference. Examine the photos closely; the Type B is real. The Type A shown is an exact duplicate of one featured in a very well known book on badges of the Third Reich, but it is not real. I haven't handled the one that is in the book, but you can draw your own conclusions.

Furthermore, if you get copies of two of the most popular books on Third Reich badges now in print and compare the photos of the Type A badges in the two books... they don't match!

The prices of these badges on collector'stables at shows give them away. You can buy a Type A for, perhaps $50.00 and a Type B for about $90.00, but you are probably not buying the real thing.

Type B badges with hollow reverses were made in Silver/Zinc, (German Silver) and Aluminum. "Orden & Ehrenzeichen" lists the silver badges at about $500.00 and the rest at about $150.00. type B was made in Zinc and Aluminum with solid backs and are listed for about $150.00. Type A, with hollow back (which again is almost impossible to find) is listed at about $350.00.

And so the "common" SA Treffen badge IS not so common after all... is it?

* * *

Mickey Huffman is a contributing columnist to DG. He has written articles on the Golden Party Badge, The Blood Order, the Gestapo Warrant Discs, the Coburg Badge and the Nuremberg 1929 Badge. He is president of the North Texas Militaria Collector's Association.Bibliography for the article included "The SA, An Historical Perspective", by Jill Halcomb.

Mickey Huffman, "What Happened In Braunschewig?And What Happened to Their Badge", Der Gauleiter, 1990

Note from German Militaria Collectibles: The photos shown above were scanned from a copy of Der Gaulieiter. Unfortunately, the original photos are not available and this is the best I could get them to come out.... If you wish more info on these badges, you can find some, including photos, on the internet. Bob

Early Nazi Party Rallies

THE EARLY "REICHSPARTEITAGS - GERMAN PARTY DAYS

What was the Reichsparteitags & what was its purpose? In this article. and preposed future articles; we hope to answer this question.

Little has been written about the mammoth celebrations held each year from 1933 to 1938. We believe these rallys played an important role in gaining and retaining support for the Nazis. This article will deal with the rallys before 1933.

The 1st party congress, or Reichs-Party-Day was held on Jan. 27 & 28 1923 in Munich. Hitler called together 5000 SA men to demonstrate the strength of the party to win popular support and to attract other groups of similar political inclinations. Little was done at this 1st congress and nothing indicated that it would be the 1st of a long series of rallys, There were however several traditions started at this 1st rally.
The Fahnenweihe ceremony (consecration of the flags) became a lasting ritual of the party. The ceremony always began with an address by Hitler. The flags were consecrated by Hitler" who touched each new flag, or standard to the original flag of the party. The SA vowed at this time, never to abandon their banners under any circumstances.

Next came the traditional "march past" by all the Storm Troopers. The next day there were various meetings, and Hitler presented all the extremist ideas of the party, and told what they planned to do.

Because the Nat. Socialists thought the Jan. 1923 rally a complete success, a second rally was held in Sept. 1923, at Nurnberg the city that had once been host to the pageantries of the Old Roman Empire. This 2nd rally was an even larger success, which won many supporters & new members. A memorial service for the dead of WWI was introduced and held each year. In this, and all other rallys, the many speakers denounced the Jews andd blamed the Versailles treaty for the Nations problems .

As we known Hitler was soon sent to prison after the Nov. 9th Munich Putsh, and the party was banned. Hitler was released in Dec. 1924 and reassembled his followers. In Jan. of 1925 the ban on the party was partially lifted.

In 1926 the party once again felt strong enough to hold a rally. The city of Weimar was chosen, because Thuringia was one of the few states in which Hitler was permitted to speak at that time. At this time, Hitler spoke of the purpose of the rally as a mass demonstration, a show of unity and strength to the movement.

To subsidize the rally, each participant was obliged to purchase a party day medal, which cost 50 pfennigs. I do not know of a pin for the 1926 rally.

Party membership jumped from 17,000 in 1926 to 40,000 in 1927, therefore, the 3 day rally of 1927, at Nurmburg was the largest show of strength thus far. Approx. 160,000 people attended. Highlights include the SA's torchlight parade, consecration of 12 new standards and the 2 hour parade of 30,000 SA men & the SS.

No rally was held in 1928 due to a decline of popularity. But in 1929, Hitler found. supporters in Germany's big industry, and won over such political groups as the Stahlelm. Soon the party once again felt strong enough for another party congress. The 1929 rally began on Aug. 2nd, in Nurmberg. The highlight of Aug. 3rd was the fireworks displplay at night. Its finale consisted of a swastika in the evening sky, surrounded by a green wreath, and crowned by a huge eagle. Five bands accompanied the 150,000 strong crowd, as it sang the national anthum. The 1st event of Aug. 4th was the National Celebration of the dead of WWI. Twentyfive new standards and eleven new storm flags were carried by the SA in the Munich putsch, which was stained with the blood of the men wounded in the street fighting. The rally concluded on Aug. 5th.

The next rally was not held until 1933. The party concentrated on gaining power during these years. When Hitler came to power in 1933, the rallys grew into national events of great significance.

Unattributed: "THE EARLY "REICHSPARTEITAGS - GERMAN PARTY DAYS", Das Hakenkreuz", 1968