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WW2 GERMAN PHOTO BOOK ABOUT LAPPLAND KORPS SOLDIERS FIGHTING IN NORTHERN FINLAND

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Few people today are very familiar with World War II in Finland and that after the Soviet invasion of Finland, the country allied itself with Nazi Germany. Adolf Hitler made a secret visit to Finland at the beginning of June 1942 and met with commander-in-chief of the Finnish Defense Forces, Marshal Carl Gustav Mannerheim and members of the Finnish government. He also visited German Wehrmacht troops deployed there.

Major Dr. A. Ruppert (Führer einer Propagandakompanie) starts by explaining to people in the German homeland where the Lapplandfront actually was and how that battle zone got its name, “War in the Wilderness”. He also explains the second purpose of Front am Polarkreis as a book for German and Finnish soldiers to remember how together they lived and fought on the Arctic Circle.

The chapters in Front am Polarkreis are accompanied by maps and beautiful watercolor prints by war artist Kurt Kranz, who after receiving his Bauhaus Academy diploma was conscripted for military service in Norway and Finland.

Front am Polarkreis: Deutsche Soldaten im Finnischen Urwald (The Front at the Arctic Circle: German Soldiers in the Finnish Wilderness) is a very interesting German book about the World War II front line in far northern Finland.

The 7-3/8 x 10 inch, 164-page hardcover book is dedicated by the German Commanding General of the Lappland-Korps to fallen comrades who fought for the freedom and future of the German Nation, as well as wounded soldiers who battled alongside brave Finnish troops in the solitude of the forests of Lappland on the Arctic Circle, and stopped the Boshevists at the European border.

In his introduction, General der Infanterie Karl Weisenberger writes about the bitter, dark winters and extremely hot summers when the sun did not set, and fighting in an area without a road network, cities or any real population to speak of. Existing towns in the Salla and Alakurtti region had been obliterated during the Finnish-Russian winter war (1939/40) and the people had been murdered and/or fled. What was left was water and rocks, elk, reindeer, bears, fish and insects. Hence, the lonely “War in the Wilderness”.

Front am Polarkreis: Deutsche Soldaten im Finnischen Urwald was produced by Ulrich Mojewski, Günter Oeltze von Lobenthal and Karl Haag, published by Wilhelm Limpert Verlag in Berlin in 1943 and printed in Finland.

This example has a special and rare 4-¼ x 5-¾ inch dedication pasted on the front flyleaf. It shows this book was given to Berlin student Rita Langner in November 1944 by the Commander of Wehrkreis III (Knights Cross recipient General Joachim von Kortzfleisch) in recognition of her especially good work in the military field. Wehrkreis III was the military district headquartered in Berlin and included the areas of modern-day Brandenburg and the historic province of Neumark. General von Kortzfleisch died in battle in the Ruhrkessel on 20 April 1945 while commanding the Rhine Bridgehead in Wehrmacht Army Group B.

This 80+ year old Nazi book is in very nice used condition with some wear to the covers. No odor.