Kraft was born on 6.11.14 in Pommern. He was 1,80m tall and joined the 5./6. SS-Totenkopf-Regiment in December 1940. He was promoted to a SS-Hauptscharführer on 1.11.1943 and has served as the SPIESS of the Kompanie. Many photos inside the album shows him with the two sleeve rings.
Soldbuch in good condition with all 28 pages. It comes with period attached portrait photo of Kraft wearing the SA and DRL Sport Badges. You will see his face inside the photo album many times. The Soldbuch was issued in December 1940. It proofs he first joined 5./6. SS-Totenkopf-Regiment and then served with SS-Gebirgsjäger-Regiment 12 Michael Gaimair which was part of SS-Gebirgs-Division Nord.
The last page gives a list of his awards: Sudetenland Medal, Austria Medal, SS Service Time Award 4th Class and War Merit Cross 2nd Class. It does not mentioned the Sport Badges as civil awards. The Soldbuch is full of entries and interesting stamps providing a lot room for additional research. The condition of the Soldbuch is very good. Page one is taped with some sort of film.
The certificate to the War Merit Cross 2nd Class was issued to Hans Kraft as a SS-Unterscharführer on 1.9.1942 a the Führerhauptquartier. It comes with a facsimile signature of Keitel. Folded once.
Finally his black SS photo album showing the runes to the front cover as well as ZUR ERINNERUNG AN MEINE DIENSTZEIT. The first pictures show Kraft in his black Allgemeine-SS uniform with the cuffband GERMANIA in Hamburg in 1937. There are pictures taken in Klagenfurt documenting the first stone laying of the SS casern in Klagenfurt. The next picture shows him in his grey SS-VT uniform on the way to the Sudetenland in 1938. There are great pictures with crusher caps.
The album is really nice subtitled and 100% period time set up. We know Kraft served with 12.SS-Reiterstandarte-Schwerin from 1.11.1938 - 15.3.1939 for example. There are really nice pictures of that part of his service time.
The following pages show pictures of his travel to Aalborg, Denmark and then Norway on 29.11.1940 via ship. The last pages show interesting photos taken in 1941, 1942 and 1944 taken in Norway, Ostpreussen and Finland.
148 photos inside the album in total. A great and rare set in good condition!
