Roger Harris

I recently discovered this very interesting First World War Jersey postcard in an Australian auction (Figure 1). The postcard is written in French by a French visitor and was posted to Calvados, France on 23 June 1917, receiving a large “JERSEY” double circle with bars No1 postmark, “10.15. AM / 23 JU / 17”.

The Jersey Censor’s Office censored it the same day where it received a superb magenta triple oval (40mm x 25mm) censor’s cachet with stars and a manuscript date “23 –VI– 17” written in the centre in an unusual mix of Arabic and Roman numerals.

The Jersey postcard, posted on 23 July 1917 to Calvados, France, has received a magenta CENSOR’S OFFICE * JERSEY * cachet and the red ink manuscript instruction “Prohibited Card / Return to Sender” + the return address circled.

The Censor has returned the postcard to the sender with the manuscript explanation written in red ink “Prohibited Card / Return to Sender”.  Within the text of the card, the Censor has found that the sender is staying at a “petite villa charmante (Cranford houle La*, Beaumont)” (* La Route de la Haule) and he has ringed this address in red ink for redirection by the Post.

A WWI Channel Island censored card is very rare as I assume most would have been destroyed as they would not normally have a return address, but this one has survived because the address is in the description of where the sender is staying.

The Jersey postcard is a topographical photographic card of St. Aubins from West prominently featuring the St. Aubins railway station and railway line.

Why was this postcard “Prohibited”?  Was every topographical photographic postcard addressed to Europe prohibited in 1917 or was it because this one illustrated a railway station and railway line that may have been a target for the enemy.

Does anyone have an explanation or own a similar card?

Mail sent from Guernsey or Alderney via Cherbourg has always been very rare, indeed the Gibbons Specialised C. I. Catalogue lists several high-priced Cherbourg entry handstamps, but also others without any prices because they have never been recorded on Channel Islands mail. 

I was therefore astonished to see two postcards recently within a very short time of each other that had been sent from Guernsey and Alderney “Via Cherbourg” in the first decade of the 20th Century.

In the CISS auction at the Chandlers Ford Solent Regional Meeting in May 2024 there was on offer a postcard from Guernsey to Paris that had entered France via Cherbourg.  The postcard had been written on 18 June 1908 but not posted until 22 June 1908 when it received a clear GUERNSEY double circle postmark with bars and cross, dated “6 PM / JU 22 / 08”. (Figure 1).

The mailboat probably left early next morning and travelling via Alderney arrived in Cherbourg on 23 June 1908 where the postcard received a CHERBOURG MANCHE single circle postmark dated “10.35 / 23 JUN / O8”.

Although I realised the postcard was very rare, I encouraged David Winnie to buy it as it fitted his collecting interests more than mine, and luckily, he managed to acquire it.

A few weeks after the auction, I found a lovely photographic postcard of the Royal Court, Alderney. (Figure 2).

Although the photographic image of the Alderney Royal Court was interesting, my attention was caught more by the endorsements on the message side of the card. The postcard was written in Alderney on 1 October 1906 and posted the following day when it received an ALDERNEY double circle, bars and cross postmark dated “A / OC 2 / 06” (Figure 3). 

The writer had arrived in Alderney from Paris from where she had previously sent a postcard to her friend Mrs. Hunt, and writes, “so I’m sending this one Via Cherbourg”.  She also endorses this card “Via Cherbourg” so she must have been sure of the existence of such a service.  Unfortunately, the card does not bear a Cherbourg transit postmark or a Southampton arrival mark so it’s impossible to be certain which route it took.

I do not know which mail boat worked a service from Guernsey to Cherbourg via Alderney.  The Alderney Seam Packet Co. ran the steam screw boats “Couriers I & II” on an almost daily service from Guernsey to Alderney, continuing to Cherbourg on Wednesdays in the summer (Figure 4), and both these cards were posted on a Tuesday so could have caught the Wednesday sailing.  A later Ward Lock Guide of 1932 mentions “the Mail Steamer ‘Verdun’, of the S.R.E.T. steamship Company…. goes to Cherbourg and Le Havre and returns to Guernsey”, but I have not been able to find any information about this boat or the company.

I must thank David Winnie for supplying the scan of his Guernsey postcard, and he and I would be grateful to know if any other members have postcards or other evidence of this Cherbourg entry route to France as well as timetables or notices of the Courier or other C.I. shipping line services to Cherbourg.

Some postcards have recently come to light sent by Capt. G.C. Alexander, Royal Army Ordnance Corps, of the Channel Islands Liberation Task Force 135, stationed on Alderney in 1945.  These postcards are postmarked on the re-opening day of the Alderney sub-post office on 21 September 1945, and the George VI 1941 definitive stamps have been cancelled with the single circle 24 mm diameter ALDERNEY / CH.IS. * datestamp first introduced in 1936 (Figure 1).

Figure 1: A sepia postcard of St. Brelades Bay, Jersey, sent by Capt. G.C. Alexander, R.A.O.C.  I.O.O.  135 F.O.D., Alderney, Channel Isles. 20^th September 1945 to his wife in Formby Lancs. Endorsed “First issue since the German occupation”. The card bears a George VI 1941 2d pale orange definitive stamp cancelled with the 24 mm dia. single circle ALDERNEY / * datestamp 21 SP 45.

Capt. Alexander was obviously a philatelist and man of some foresight as the postcards that he sent to his wife in Formby are all Jersey views purchased when he first landed in Jersey with the Task Force. He has endorsed them “20th September 1945 / First issue since the German Occupation.”  He mentions the first issue of the 1941 definitive stamps in the Island but does not mention the “reopening” of the sub-post office on Friday 21 September 1945. Does this mean that the sub-post office was opened a day earlier in the week for the sale of stamps and other business and the mail was only postmarked on the Friday?

CISS Chairman, David Winnie, in Volume 37 No. 4 of Les Iles Normandes, cites an envelope which he illustrates, also datestamped 21 September 1945, as evidence that this was the first day of opening because the enclosed letter states “Today the GPO has reopened the Alderney branch….”, but the letter is not dated! Perhaps the sender also bought his George VI 1941 definitive stamps on the 20 September and posted his letter, but the mail was only postmarked the following day.

Col. F.W. Marriette was appointed Alderney Sub-Postmaster in 1939, but within less than a year the threat of occupation by Germany forced him to close the Post Office on 22 June 1940 and evacuate the Island for England the following day, along with most of Alderney’s population.

Alderney was liberated on 16 May 1945 and, until September, the postal facilities were operated by the British Army Postal Service.  The sub-post office building had been stripped by the Germans and in September an officer of the Guernsey Post Office was sent to the Island with postage stamps and equipment, to re-establish a post office that was opened on 20/21 September 1945.  As Alderney evacuees could not return to the Island until December 1945, the only people on the Island when the Post Office reopened were members of Task Force 135 and a few Guernsey officials and workers. Col. Marriette did not resume his posting until 1 October 1946 when the Guernsey Post Office official returned to Guernsey.

Is Alderney 21 September 1945 mail Philatelic?

Any mail bearing George VI 1941 definitive stamps with a 21 September 1945 Alderney postmark addressed to the UK is very rare (Figure 2), but probably all examples could be classed as ‘Philatelic’ as there were very few civilians on the Island and the Task Force 135 members were entitled to post free ‘On Active Service’ mail so did not need to buy postage stamps.  Although these covers and postcards may be philatelic, they are significant as they mark an important date in Channel Islands postal history, they were sent by the Channel Islands liberators, and few exist. Any mail from the Task Force to an Alderney address should certainly be regarded as philatelic as must any covers bearing Guernsey Occupation stamps as they were never issued in Alderney (these are usually addressed to known Guernsey philatelists).

The Single Circle 24 mm diameter ALDERNEY * datestamp.

When the Alderney sub-post office was re-opened in 1945 it was issued with the single circle 24mm diameter ALDERNEY * datestamp first introduced in 1936.  The Germans had stripped the Post Office during the Occupation and so it is interesting to speculate how this datestamp survived.  It seems unlikely that there was time to send it to Guernsey before the Occupation, so did Col. Marriette take it with him when he was evacuated to England?  Somehow it was kept safe for the day five years later when the Alderney sub-office would again re-open.

The envelope bears a Zollikerberg Registration label No.123 and three Swiss definitive stamps cancelled with two double circle postmarks of ZOLLIKERBERG (ZURICH) dated 16.VIII.41. 

The German KENN No. 712 for Jersey Feldpost registered mail has been added in manuscript, as has the manuscript “Paris D.” for direction.  These manuscript marks were probably added when the letter first entered the German postal system.

The reverse of the Swiss envelope bears the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht Frankfurt Transit Censor tape with code “e” tied to the envelope with a Frankfurt censor cachet struck in red and the initialled individual censor’s cachet “1221” struck in black.

Civilian mail addressed to the Jersey German Feldpost, especially from Switzerland, is unknown as there would normally be no reason for a foreign civilian to contact the Feldpost.

The size of the envelope indicates that it probably contained another envelope for return, and I would conjecture that the sender was possibly a philatelist hoping to obtain a cover with Jersey stamps attached, not realizing that the German Feldpost did not hold stocks of Jersey stamps and that the request should have been made to the Jersey Post Office.

Paris was occupied on 14th June 1940, one month after the German Wehrmacht had stormed into France. Eight days later, France signed an armistice, and a puppet French state was set up in Vichy.  The German authorities immediately ordered all foreign diplomats to leave Paris and so the official Irish Legation duly followed the French government to Vichy.

Minister for Ireland,

Count Gerald O’Kelly de Gallagh et Tycooly

A “likeable rogue” and renegade, Count Gerald O’Kelly de Gallagh et Tycooly, from Tipperary, had been involved with setting up the first Irish diplomatic mission in Paris in 1919 and was minister plenipotentiary in Paris from 1929 until 1935, when he was forced from his post as part of a shabby De Valera / Sien Féin purge of pro Anglo-Irish Treaty members of the diplomatic corps.

To soften the blow, Count O’Kelly was given the title “special counsellor” and it was under this ambiguous, semi-official designation that he remained in Paris during the early part of the Occupation to represent Irish interests in Paris and the occupied territories of France when the official members of the Irish Legation moved to Vichy.

Count O’Kelly’s Consular Services

Defying German and Vichy French instructions, Count O’Kelly ran his “consular services” out of the premises of his wine company, Vendôme Vines, at 8 Place Vendome.  He issued Irish passports to Irish people with British passports, and regularly visited the appalling Internment camp for British civilians at Besançon to liberate any Irish citizens wrongly incarcerated. 

The Legation d’Irlande Consular Mail Service – July 1940 to mid 1941.

Count O’Kelly also ran a Consular Mail Servicefor correspondents in Ireland who thought it safer to send messages intended for the occupied parts of France and the occupied Channel Islands, via the Paris Legation d’Irlande, rather than direct through the post.

When Count O’Kelly de Gallagh maintained his Consular mail service, he endorsed the back of the envelopes with a name for the correspondence and the address of his quasi “Legation d’Irlande” at 8 Place Vendome.

A Legation d’Irlande Consular envelope with a message from Ireland, postmarked on 21 February 1941 with a Paris machine cancel and addressed to Mons. W.H. Darby, Ommaroo Hotel, has been redirected to 29 Pierson Rd.

The name on the back of the envelope identifying the correspondence is “d’Esterre Darby”

and the return address is

the Legation d’Irlande.

Back of the envelope:

Sent from the

Legation d’Irlande,

8 Place Vendome

Paris

The envelope has been censored and sealed in Paris with a dumb brown tape and red Dienststielle Feldpost

Nr. 21476 B censor cachet.

Count O’Kelly’s Continuing Mail Service from mid 1941 to ?

The front of a Count O’Kelly Consular envelope (no longer Legation d’Irlande) with a message from Ireland, postmarked on 9 JUIL 41 with a Paris machine cancel. (Note inverted year slug!)

Count O’Kelly was left to his own devices, working unhindered until mid 1941 when the Germans finally insisted that his “Paris Legation d’Irlande” should be shut, but there is evidence that he continued his mail service between Ireland and the Channel Islands endorsing envelopes with his own name and address rather than “Legation d’Irlande” as illustrated by this letter.

The back of the envelope sent to Jersey on 9 July 1941, after Count O’Kelly was forced to close down his Paris Legation d’Irlande, bears similar endorsements as previous Legation envelopes, but now his name replaces the “Legation d’Irlande” title in the address:

de Mons. H. d’Esterre Darby

c/o Le Comte O’Kelly de Gallagh

8 Place Vendome 8    Paris.

This letter reached Jersey without encountering German censorship; perhaps this was because it no longer carried the endorsement “Legation d’Irlande”.

The Conundrum of the correspondence name on backs of both letters.

Count O’Kelly has endorsed both letters “d’Esterre Darby” even though only the addressee of the first envelope is a Darby family member, W.H. Darby, while the second is Miss J. Donchex; both living at 29 Pierson Rd. St Helier. Sir Henry D’Esterre Darby was an Admiral in the Royal Navy (1750-1823) at the time of Nelson, living at Leap Castle, Roscrea, the family home since 1649. No Darby family member used the name “d’Esterre” in the 20th Century and the family moved to England in 1922 after Leap castle was burnt down. I wonder if the correspondent’s name on the back of the envelope is a code of the sender, or Count O’Kelly de Gallagh’s attempt to confuse the Germans.

Count O’Kelly’s other War Work

Count O’Kelly was pro-British even though at least 70% of his wine clients were Germans, including Herman Goëring!

He ran an escape route to Spain for downed British airmen, fed information to Britain via the French Resistance, and held in safekeeping for the duration, James Joyce’s papers when he fled France in 1940 for Zurich.

Postscript

I displayed the two covers at the Society meeting on 11^th February 2023, and ‘predictably’, fellow member Gerald Marriner stated that he also had a Paris Legation d’Irlande envelope with contents, addressed to Guernsey. He kindly sent me scans of the envelope and letter which is illustrated below.

The envelope is an official Irish Legation envelope imprinted with the title “ÉIRE”.

It is addressed to Guernsey and has been postmarked with a Paris machine cancel dated 10.1.1941.

The back of the envelope has no endorsement by Count O’Kelly.

It bears the smudged end of the machine cancel and a double circle GUERNSEY receiving postmark dated 21 FE 41 indicating that it took six weeks to travel from Paris to Guernsey!

The envelope displays no German censorship although glue marks indicate it may have been opened and resealed.

The contents of the Irish Legation envelope sent to Guernsey.

A typed letter from Count G. O’Kelly de Gallagh

giving his titles

Minister Plenipotentiary

Special Counseller

And the address:

LEGATION D’IRLANDE.

Chancellerie Provisoire

8, Place Vendome,

Paris.

This letter dated, Paris 8^th Jan. 1941, states that “a request for news concerning you has reached the Legation from Dublin”; this was at a time when all correspondence from Dublin should have been routed through the official Irish Legation in Vichy.

Both Gerald and I would be interested to know if any members have any other Irish Legation messages sent via Paris or Vichy to the Channel Islands.

In 2022 I found this interesting lot in a German auction that consisted of 8 copies of the Jersey Evening Post newspaper that had been sent by the subscription department of the newspaper, via the German Feldpost, to a Luftwaffe doctor working in a specialist Luftwaffe hospital in Kitzbühel, Austria.  The doctor must have held a paid subscription to the Jersey Evening Post during the war years.

Each of the newspapers is contained within a newspaper wrapper label that bears a Jersey Feldpost postmark with the code letter ‘g’.  The date of each postmark corresponds with the date of its newspaper.  Only one of the newspapers has been removed from its wrapper for display; the other seven have never been opened.­

The newspaper label for the Evening Post of 12 June 1944 has the Jersey FELDPOST postmark with code ‘g’, dated 13.6 44, and is addressed to: Dr. Schlaegel, Lw.-Kurlazarett, (12b)  Kitzbühel.

The Hospital

Lw.-Kurlazarett, (12b) Kitzbühel was a specialist hospital of the Luftwaffe situated 64 km SW of Salzburg in the west of Austria.  In the fall of 1944, it was assigned a number and became Lw.-Kurlazarett 1/VII.

These specialist hospitals were ‘Luftwaffe Curative Treatment Hospitals’ devoted to using the Sulphur water, mineral water, hot springs, spa approach to treatment rather than the more modern scientific medical approach.  The Luftwaffe’s hospital network averaged about 10 of these hospitals during the wartime years.

The Newspapers

Dr. Schlaegel’s newspapers are from a period a week after the D-Day landings up to 26 July 1944 when it is probable that the Feldpost in Jersey could no longer accept them.  It is not known for how long the Evening Post continued to try and fulfill the subscription and post the newspapers or if these were indeed the last ones to leave the island.

The newspapers raise many interesting questions:

Why did Dr. Schlaegel have a regular subscription to the Jersey Evening Post?

Had the doctor been posted to Jersey at some time during the war or did he have other connections with Jersey?

Did Dr. Schlaegel ever receive these eight newspapers, and if he did, why were they never opened?

The newspapers seem to have left Jersey, but did they arrive at the hospital or were they lost on route?  One appears to have a receiving date stamp applied in red.

Where have the newspapers been for the last 79 years and why have they appeared in Germany now? (One has childlike colouring of the postmark so it may have been in a family home at some time.)

Postscript

I displayed the newspapers in the ‘Three Sheets to Tell a Story’ competition, for members who attended the Market Harborough weekend meeting in April 2022.  After a very convivial dinner on the Saturday night at which Gavin Wood plied me with quantities of wine, the newspapers now reside in his collection.

In the last Journal, our French member Henri Chartier showed five postcards and a cover that he had recently acquired.  Two cards had descriptions, but three cards and the envelope were shown without narrative or captions. I have been asked to comment on these because, on a cursory viewing, they look as if they are all associated with the First World War French seaplane base in Guernsey; closer inspection however proves that this is not necessarily the case.

CARD ONE

Printed Caption:

LA BASSE NORMANDIE PITTORESQUE

2362 – CHERBOURG (Manche). – Hydravion prêt à prendre son vol

This is a printed postcard published by Le Goubey – St Pierre Eglise, showing the entrance to the Centre d’Aviation Maritime de Cherbourg. (Cherbourg Naval Seaplane Base).

Two different monochrome versions and this colour tinted printing of the card were published by Le Goubey, probably after the end of the Great War, as the hydro aeroplane viewed on the slipway is a Georges Levy G.L. 40 HB2 that first entered service in November 1917 and was never seen in Guernsey.

Pioneer Aviation in the Channel Islands Vol.1 Chapter 12 illustrates this card in reference to a Cherbourg based Georges Levy G.L. 40 HB2 that made an emergency landing in Jersey on the sands by Millbrook on 16 August 1923.

I assume Henri showed this card because the Cherbourg base is the destination that his next card is addressed to.

CARD TWO

An ‘On Active Service’ post-free postcard from the French Military Seaplane Base in Guernsey addressed to the Naval Arsenal in Cherbourg.

The author of this postcard was Gerard Sauvée, a Quarter Master Mechanic at the Escadrille d’Aviation Maritime de Guernsey (the French seaplane base in Guernsey).  Several postcards are recorded from Sauvée written in his distinctively bold, scratchy pen, all addressed to an Enseigne Louis Vacquement at various addresses in Cherbourg: the Centre d’Aviation Maritime de Cherbourg, the Arsenal Maritime, and a civilian address in the town when Vacquement was promoted to an “Enseigne de Vaisseau” – a naval sub-lieutenant.

The Guernsey seaplane base was initially established with members of the disbanded Adriatic seaplane squadron who had been based in Venice.  Sauvée was a member of this Squadron and the messages on his cards often complain about the Guernsey weather and food compared to that of Italy.

Initially the Guernsey base did not have its own cachet.  This postcard bears an early cachet that had been brought to Guernsey by the Venice Squadron.   It is a 27mm diameter double circular cachet reading around the edge “ESCADRILLE D’AVIATION DE …..”;  there follows a 28mm gap from which the name “VENISE” or “L’ADRIATIQUE” has been excised.

All the postcards written by Sauvée bear the handwritten endorsement “SERVICE AIR” (indicated on the card with a pencil arrow). It was this endorsement that gave rise to the erroneous assumption by early collectors that an airmail service flew between the Guernsey and Cherbourg bases.  The endorsement however indicated that the sender was on active service with the Aviation Maritime and the cards should be delivered “Post Free” through the normal post; similarly, a French soldier would write “SERVICE MILITAIRE” or a sailor “SERVICE A LA MER” to ensure “Post Free” mail.

In 1964, the French Consular Agent in Guernsey, Monsieur L.V. Lambert, who had been a pilot at the Guernsey base, stated to Bill Newport that there had been no special postal facilities provided for the base, the mail went post free through the Guernsey Post and there was no airmail service to Cherbourg.

                                                                                           CARD THREE

A post-free postcard addressed to Le Genets, France, bearing a “MARINE FRANCAISE *SERVICE A LA MER*” double circle cachet with anchor, in blue, a double circle Guernsey 17 SP 15 postmark and a faint Le Genets receiving postmark.

The “MARINE FRANCAISE *SERVICE A LA MER*” cachet was a French Navy cachet indicating that the sender was on active service and entitled to free post.  Various versions of the cachet were widely used on French Navy ships and shore bases; the Guernsey seaplane base had a distinctive bold 35mm diameter version with the anchor rope forming the inner second circle.

The postcard illustrated was not sent from the Guernsey seaplane base because it was post-marked on 17 September 1915, two years before the seaplane base was built!  As there was no French Navy base in Guernsey in 1915, this card must have been sent by a sailor from a visiting French naval ship or submarine.

The postcard breaks several censorship conventions: 

The writer should have indicated his name and rank and the card should have been countersigned by a senior officer.

The writer should not have indicated his location – Guernsey. (This would have been picked up by the Senior Officer.)

The Guernsey Post Office should have used a dumb cancel on military mail, rather than also indicating the location with the Main Post Office postmark.

In 1915 the Channel Islands were yet to be affected by the war.  Some Guernsey men sailed to England to enlist, but the Royal Guernsey Militia (reformed as the Royal Guernsey Light Infantry in December 1916) did not see action in France until September 1917, so the conventions for handling military mail were not strictly enforced or understood in the Islands in 1915.  Indeed, the Guernsey Post Office does not seem to have received a “dumb” postmark for use on service mail until 1918.

The use of this Navy “MARINE FRANCAISE * SERVICE A LA MER*” cachet in Guernsey is exceedingly rare, especially linked with a Guernsey postmark.  I have never seen one before and this may be a unique example.

LETTER FOUR

A letter from the French Guernsey Seaplane Base addressed to England, bearing an “ESCADRILLE D’AVIATION DE GUERNSEY” cachet stamped in violet with a George V postage stamp cancelled with a Guernsey Post Office “dumb” cancel.

This envelope presents a conundrum as it bears the French Guernsey Seaplane Base cachet, “ESCADRILLE D’AVIATION DE GUERNSEY” but is not endorsed “SERVICE AIR” or “ON ACTIVE SERVICE”.  The sender must have been a civilian as they have attached a George V one penny definitive for delivery to England.  This is the first indication I have seen that a Guernsey civilian might have worked at the base.

The Guernsey Post Office’s new dumb cancel has been used to cancel the stamp, but this security is somewhat futile as the French cachet clearly states the location of posting.

(I have seen one other very similar typed envelope addressed to England bearing the French Guernsey cachet, but it also bore the typed English endorsement, “ON ACTIVE SERVICE” and a boxed “CENSORED” cachet that was over-stamped with the dumb cancel.  The Censor had also initialed the French Guernsey cachet.  English Navy seaplanes visited the base and I assume that this envelope may have been sent from an English service man working at the base and that it was censored because it was sent overseas to England.)

In my book Pioneer Aviation in the Channel Islands Vol.1 Chapter 03, I explain and illustrate in detail the history and postal service of the French seaplane base in Guernsey.

Many years ago, I bought this German registered letter envelope from a dealer in America.  It had been written up by the previous owner as a 1944 Fortress supply flight Feldpost letter from Guernsey, but this was obviously incorrect because it was not a Feldpost letter and the registered label was issued from the post office at Winterbach (SAAR) where the postage stamps had been cancelled on 11 November 1944.  There was a supply flight out of Guernsey on the night of 9 November, but the letter almost certainly had not been flown out of Guernsey on this flight and posted from Winterbach by the pilot, as the relief supply flights at the time were flown by aircraft of Luftwaffe Transport Wing 30 from Frankfurt/Main which is more than 200 Km north of Winterbach.

What could have led the previous owner to think that this was a letter from Guernsey?  The clue is on the back of the envelope where there is a double circle receiving postmark of Berlin-Charlottenburg, dated 14 November 1944.  The envelope was sealed with stamp selvedge, so the flap has been cut open with a sharp blade.  In the process, whatever was written on the flap has been lost except for part of a red crayon endorsement that clearly ends with the word “Guernsey”!  This of course could have made it just a simple fake except for the fact that the letter was also originally endorsed with a soldier’s name and Feldpost number 45636 that was indeed a Channel Islands Feldpost number in 1944.

I found the script of the German address difficult to decipher and failed to discover anything more about the cover until I attended a London CISS meeting some years later.  I displayed the cover to the members present who were unable to offer any further insight into it, but by lucky coincidence our German expert member, Michael Wieneke, was also visiting the meeting and he was able to decipher the address as that of the Berlin broadcasting radio station in Charlottenburg, but he was still unable to explain the reference to Guernsey.

I rushed home to consult my few examples of Atlantic Fortress Radio Message cards and although these contained messages received at the Kriegsmarine Intelligence Department radio station at the naval base in Wilhelmshaven on the north coast of Germany, from where they were also posted, the  address printed on the card to which recipients should send their replies was:

“Kameradschaftsdienst West, Gruppe PK”, Haus des Rundfunks,

(1)          Berlisn-Charlottenburg, Masurenallee.

Translation: (Comradeship Service West, Group PK, Broadcasting House,

(1)          Berlin-Charlottenburg, Masurenallee.)

This was the exact address written on my registered letter from Winterbach!

Finally, the conundrum of the registered letter was solved; it had contained the reply to an Atlantic Fortress Radio Message card for the KANALINSELN Fortress.  Replies to the Fortresses were addressed to the Berlin Broadcasting House where the “Comradeship Service” would sort them via their Feldpost number to the relevant Fortress.  The Feldpost number 45636 on the registered letter was recognised as being allocated to Guernsey and consequently the back of the envelope received the red crayon manuscript endorsement indicating that the reply message was intended for transmission to the Guernsey fortress.

I still cannot explain why the message was sent by registered mail as this was contrary to instructions printed on the Fortress Radio cards that stated that replies should be “in short form (telegram style) on an open postcard”.  The envelope could not contain anything other than a message as nothing could be delivered to the Fortresses.  The postal services within Germany in late 1944 were being disrupted by the Allied advance and bombing so the sender may have thought that a registered letter would stand a better chance of delivery than a simple postcard.

How did the Registered Letter reach the USA?

I can only conjecture what happened to the letter after it was delivered to the Broadcasting House in Berlin.  The message that it contained may have been transmitted from the radio station in Berlin and the envelope retained in the records there, or more likely it may have been sent in a ‘Guernsey batch’ to Wilhelmshaven for transmission by the Kriegsmarine Intelligence Department radio station.

Wilhelmshaven was captured by the Poles aided by the Canadians in April 1945 and the whole of Berlin was captured at the same time by the Russians.  Even when Berlin was divided by the Allies and Charlottenburg became part of the British zone, rather bizarrely, the Berlin Broadcasting House remained in the possession of the Russians within the British Zone.  It is unlikely therefore that the letter was a simple trophy picked up by an American GI and taken back or sent back home. 

In the search for war criminals, members of the Gestapo and S.S., much intelligence in the form of records and documents, especially from radio stations, was collected and sent for analysis either to Britain or the USA and I suspect that this rather important looking letter may have been amongst that “intelligence” sent to the USA. Of no significance, it was later probably discarded or released to the American collecting public.

A “reply postcard” addressed to the Berlin Broadcasting House for the Channel Islands Fortress has never been recorded, but I suspect that this Registered letter is a unique example of a reply intended for a German soldier of the Kanalinseln Fortress stationed in Guernsey.