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Spanish Blue Division


Kenny Andrew

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The Spanish Volunteer Division was designated the 250th (“Blue”) Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht on 25 July 1941. The Division left active service on 23 December 1943 after seeing considerable and bloody combat on the Eastern front, particularly around Leningrad. It was called the "Blue Division" because the original uniform included the distinctive dark blue shirts of the Spanish Fascists (the Falange), however, the Division adopted German uniforms as soon as they reached Germany.

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I once had a ''Blue Division'' helmet genuine to! i sold it for £200 which i bet i cocked up on! wonder where it is now?

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Hi RAF , I wouldn't worry too much about it, most unlikely it was original , there are very few known examples of them in fact only three I have heard of. This one was dug up in Russia and there seems to be questions about it too. They are very very rare and unlikely to turn up even in photos.

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my god! thanks for telling me glad it was not genuine then!

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Sounds like you got the better part of the deal RAF. Here is the Spanish Blue Division Medal.It was instituted on January 3rd 1944 to recognize the 250th Infantry Division.The Medal was die struck in zinc alloy with a bronze wash. It was produced by the German Firm Deschler und Sohn and measured 32mm in diameter and 1mm in width.

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gosh its amazing! i saw one at the War and peace show down where i am, didnot bother asking how much it was as his HJ dagger i was intrested in was £900 :o i mean what a con i bought mine for £100!

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£900 for an HJ dagger that is crazy money :o that's more than double what you would pay for a mint top of the range example !!! I wonder if he sold it ??? Here is the Arm shield worn by members of the Blue Division.By the order of the German Army High Command an official Spanish national shield was authorized to be worn on uniform on 9 July 1941. The shield is machine weave, normally referred by collectors as BeVo because of the "Bevo-Wuppertal" firm, which used to manufacture many foreign legion insignias. Spanish made shields were also made and worn as well as printed types.

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wow where do you find this stuff! :huh: wish i had 200 of these! :D id be buying a Tiger tank optic sight!

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  • 2 years later...

I recently bought a Spanish Blue Div Medal and have been looking into the history of the Spanish Volunteer division's.

It's interesting reading, even after the "official" withdrawl of the Azul Division in 1943. Many individual Spaniards dec-

ided to fight on of their own accord. THey were formed into the "Unit Ezquerra" of the Waffen-SS. The unit took it's

name from Miguel Ezquerra a SS Hauptsturmfuhrer. To cut a long story short. ( Last Days-Final Battles Of The Spanish

SS In Berlin),

In March 1945, Waffen-Haupsturmfuhrer der-SS Miguel Ezquerra was commissioned to enlist all the Spaniards he could

find into one unit,including remnants of the 101st and the 102nd Kompanies, which he would command.

By April they were located in the centre of Berlin as part of the 11th SS Freiwilligen-Panzergrenadier division "Nordland".

The capital was in ruins but the Spanish small band of men remaining in Germany could be heard during the brutal

fighting at many strategic locations; Anhalter Banhof, Moritz Platz, Potsdammer Platz, Ubhan Anhalter. They fought

bravely in the siege of the Propaganda Ministry and the Chancellors Office.

On May 1st the remainder of the Einsatz Gruppe, alongside the 15th Waffen Grenadier Division defended the Steglitz

underground station and desperately tried to link up with the remainder of the Gross Deutschland Rgt holding the

Alexander Platz underground station but Soviet infiltration units had blocked Friedrich Strabe underground station.

The eighty-or-so survivors (again estimates vary) were part of the general surrender in the following days.

The men of the "Unit Ezquerra" were amongst the last troops fighting the Russians in the rubble of Berlin.

 

 

 

Most of the items pictured are from the collection of Mr Luis Navazzo. (not sure of last picture) ??

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Interesting Leon.I read a good book on the Charlemagne battle group that fought its way back into Berlin,they were predominantly French.A fair proportion of the Reich Capitals defenders were Foreign.Very brave or very delusional? Contrary to much propaganda not all Foreign soldiers were fighting against Bolshevism,indeed many were not particularly interested in the politics,they were simply doing it as they were young unemployed and sought the adventure, however crazy that sounds.

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Osprey do quite a good book on the Blue Division. It is written by a spanish guy. Seems better than most of their recent titles.

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Yes Steve it is a little known fact of the one million men who served in the Waffen-SS during the course of the war.

60 per cent-(600,000 Men)-were volunteers from countries outside Germany.Ethnic Germans were in fact a minority

of the Waffen-SS, a fact often forgotten.

Non-German volunteers came from the Netherlands, Belgium, Finland, France, Denmark, Norway, Lithuania, Latvia,

Estonia, the Ukraine, Byelorussia, Spain, Italy, Hungary,Yugoslavia and even a small group of British volunteers.

Known as the Legion of St. George.

THe foreign Waffen-SS units were all deployed on the Eastern Front, for two reasons. Firstly they had specifically

volluntered to fight Communism. And secondly so that they would never be asked to fight fellow countrymen in

their countries. All but a few thousand of the 20,000 French Waffen-SS volunteers.Oranized into a division called

Legion Charlemagne were killed in the Battle of Berlin.

 

 

 

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Heres a photo of Haupsturmfuhrer Miguel Ezquerra. And picture of a Bf109 of the Blue Squadron formed from

aviator volunteers,using Bf109s and Fw190s were credited with 156 Soviet aircraft kills.

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  • 7 years later...

Most people are aware that Spain, although officially neutral in WW2, was pro-German. But some may be surprised they took an active role in the war. The Germans helped General Francisco Franco win the civil war in the 1930's to become the ruler/dictator for several decades. Shortly after the invasion of Russia in 1941, the Spanish sent a message to Berlin asking if they could send volunteers to help the fight. Hitler approved the use of Spanish volunteers on 24 June 1941. The Spanish, with Franco's blessing were allowed to volunteer to fight the Communists on the eastern front, not the allies in the west. Volunteers flocked to recruiting offices in all the metropolitan areas of Spain. Cadets from the officer training school in Zaragoza volunteered in particularly large numbers and were given leave by the Spanish army. Initially, the Spanish government was prepared to send about 4,000 men, but soon realized that there were more than enough volunteers to fill an entire division: 18,104 men in all, with 2,612 officers and 15,492 soldiers.

Fifty percent of officers and NCOs were professional soldiers given leave from the Spanish army, including many veterans of the Spanish Civil War. Many others were members of the Falange (the Spanish Fascist party). Others felt pressure to join because of past ties with the Republic or—like Luis García Berlanga, who later became a well-known cinema director—to save relatives in prison from execution.

General Agustín Muñoz Grandes was assigned to lead the volunteers. Because the soldiers could not use official Spanish army uniforms, they adopted a symbolic uniform comprising the red berets of the Carlists, the khaki trousers of the Spanish Legion, and the blue shirts of the Falangists—hence the nickname "Blue Division". This uniform was used only while on leave in Spain; in the field, soldiers wore the German Army (Wehrmacht Heer) field grey uniform with a shield on the upper right sleeve bearing the word "España" and the Spanish national colours.

On July 13, 1941, the first train left Madrid for Grafenwöhr, Bavaria for a further five weeks of training. There they became the Heer's 250th Infantry Division, and were initially divided into four infantry regiments, as in a standard Spanish division. To aid their integration into the German supply system, they soon adopted the standard Heer model of three regiments. One of the original regiments was dispersed amongst the others, which were then named after three of the Spanish cities that volunteers largely originated from—Madrid, Valencia and Seville. Each regiment had three battalions (of four companies each) and two weapons companies, supported by an artillery regiment of four battalions (of three batteries each). There were enough men left over to create an assault battalion, mainly sub-machine gun armed. Later, due to casualties, this was disbanded. Aviator volunteers formed a Blue Squadron (Escuadrillas Azules) which, using Bf 109s and FW 190s, was credited with 156 Soviet aircraft kills.

On 31 July, after taking the standard personal oath to Hitler, under whose authority they were to be fighting, the Blue Division was formally incorporated into the German Wehrmacht as the 250th Division. It was initially assigned to Army Group Center, the spearheading force advancing towards Moscow.

The division was transported by train to Suwałki, Poland (August 28), from where it had to continue by foot on a 900 km march. It was scheduled to travel through Grodno (Belarus), Lida (Belarus), Vilnius (Lithuania), Molodechno (Belarus), Minsk (Belarus), Orsha (Belarus) to Smolensk, and from there to the Moscow front. While marching towards the Smolensk front on September 26, the Spanish volunteers were rerouted from Vitebsk and re-assigned to Army Group North (the force closing on Leningrad), becoming part of the German 16th Army. The Blue Division was first deployed on the Volkhov River front, with its headquarters in Grigorovo, on the outskirts of Novgorod. It was in charge of a 50 km section of the front north and south of Novgorod, along the banks of the Volkhov River and Lake Ilmen.

In August 1942, it was transferred north to the southeastern flank of the Leningrad siege, just south of the Neva near Pushkin, Kolpino and Krasny Bor in the Izhora River area.

After the collapse of the German southern front following the Battle of Stalingrad, more German troops were deployed southwards. By this time, General Emilio Esteban Infantes had taken command.

The Blue Division faced a major Soviet attempt to break the siege of Leningrad in February 1943, when the 55th Army of the Soviet forces, reinvigorated after the victory at Stalingrad, attacked the Spanish positions at the Battle of Krasny Bor, near the main Moscow-Leningrad road. Despite very heavy casualties, the Spaniards were able to hold their ground against a Soviet force seven times larger and supported by tanks. The assault was contained and the siege of Leningrad was maintained for a further year. The division remained on the Leningrad front where it continued to suffer heavy casualties due to weather and to enemy action.  When Franco dispatched more reinforcements, this time it included conscripts as well as volunteers. Through rotation, as many as 45,482 Spanish soldiers served on the Eastern Front. They were awarded both Spanish and German military awards, and were the only division to be awarded a medal of their own, commissioned by Hitler.

 

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The Spanish Volunteer Medal formally known as the Commemorative Medal for Spanish Volunteers in the Struggle Against Bolshevism (German: Erinnerungsmedaille für die spanischen Freiwilligen im Kampf gegen den Bolschewismus), commissioned 3 January 1944, was awarded by the Third Reich to recognize the men of the Blue Division who served at the Russian front during World War II. This force, attached to the Heer of the Wehrmacht, known as the 250th Infantry Division (span.), was in total composed of 47,000 men, sent by Francisco Franco to aid the Third Reich, in part, as a way to pay back Adolf Hitler's help during the Spanish Civil War.

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Here are some images from the internet showing the Blue Division in German uniforms. Below is an early example as they are still wearing the gas cape pouches, note the spanish decal on the Helmet.

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Nice photo of Spanish Pilots in Luftwaffe uniforms with a ME-109 behind them. When I was in Spain from 2007-2009, I went to the Spanish Air Base at Moron, outside of Seville, in the headquarters building, the walls are filled with images such as this one, they are quite proud of their heritage. 

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This one was titled: Spanish NCO kissing his girlfriend goodbye. Nice view of the uniform and insignia. Note the Iron Cross ribbon and Spanish shield on the arm

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Spanish Volunteer Medal (Spanish Government Issued)

The Spanish Government presented the Division with a commemorative medal of its own. This award was surmounted by a Spanish Crown, with its main feature being a Spanish Eagle with an enamel Iron Cross in the center, representative of the collaboration between the nations. The reverse featured the Kremlin and the inscription “Rusia 1941”, denoting that the struggle was in the East. It was held by a white ribbon that had on either side with the national colors of Spain and the Third Reich.

The medal was presented to all Spanish Volunteers who fought against bolshevism in Russia. Because the swastika was not outlawed in Spain following the war, veterans continued to wear their awards as originally designed. This meant that there was a market for replacements, so this medal was in production after the end of the war. 

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The photos and items remind me of my early days of collecting, while still at school. There were three other collector associates at school, and each of us had his own "amazing" and fascinating items and topics. One of them had a real talent for picking up notable items, which at the time were not quite cheap, but a paltry compared to todays prices. He had all the notable war shields, even Cholm, Narvik and Lappland, definite originals - former costs between 2-3000 Euros today - and army and naval war badges He also had both Blue Division awards, and a collection of photos including the Spanish one shown at top of article here. Unfortunately he lost interest rather early and started selling things off. Even after 50 years of collecting I still have not caught up with him in some fields. One item I did get from him was a superb Bavarian 1916 artillery Bluse.

 

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 I wish I would have picked up some of this Blue Division stuff awhile back when it was affordable. 

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Have moved this to the History forum and merged with another thread on the Blue division. Will tidy up duplicate photos and information later.  

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  • 2 weeks later...

Here is a nice image of blue division member with the MG-34 and gunners pouch, note the shield on his arm. 

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