Major Arthur Haussels (February 4, 1895 – February 13, 1943)

Major Arthur Haussels was the battalion commander (II./Gebirgs-Jäger-Regiment 139/3. Mountain Division) Haussels proved himself in the operation "Weserübung" and in the Battle of Narvik. In March 1942 he took over command of the regiment as successor to Alois Windisch. In 1943, Lieutenant Colonel Haussels commanded the 756 Mountain Jaeger Regiment, which was set up in December 1942. On January 18, 1943, the operation "Eilbote" began under the command of the 334th Infantry Division under Major General Friedrich Weber. His mountain troops flew with Jus 52 from Naples to North Africa. His men conquered the Djebel Solbia mountains and later (under Holzinger) the Djebel Mansour in north-east Tunisia. In this battle, the mountain infantry was defeated by soldiers of the Foreign Legion. "You fought like lions" said a captured foreign legionnaire of German origin after the fight. In February 1943, while in the hospital, Haussels was promoted to colonel for bravery in the face of the enemy.

"[...] I myself flew to North Africa on January 18, 1943, with about 10 men, an infantry gun, 2 field kitchens and various equipment. The group of planes consisted of about 50 machines and flew towards Sicily at a height of about 50 m above the sea. As we approached, we saw another group of Ju 52s circling over Palermo, which then joined our formation. After landing at Tunis airfield, we were overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of our Luftwaffe comrades astonished when unloading, but soon we realized from a pile of wrecked planes that we couldn't overlook that we really had to hurry. Since the German transport planes, for some inexplicable reason, left Naples at the same time as the train at 5 or 6 a.m., the enemy fighter pilots were able to score plenty of kills over the Bay of Tunis. We were lucky that day and were not bothered. 2 days later the planes that had just landed were bombed and the airfield looked as if it had been sprinkled with confetti. The 'confetti' was all the mail for the 5th Panzer Army in Tunisia. At the end of January 1943, a whole group was shot down over the Mediterranean Sea and not a single machine arrived in Tunis. Around January 25, 1943, the Geb.Jäg.Rgt. 756 was detached from the divisional formation and formed an independent combat group with Panzer Battalion 501, equipped with new Tiger tanks, which was used in the sector of a badly battered Italian division. The task of the combat group was to set up an HKL in the mountains to the west and thus for the Africa Army under Field Marshal Rommel arriving from Libya in southern Tunisia to keep their back free. Heavy fighting broke out again and again with the retreating French troops, whose artillery shot very well and who were already being strongly supported by British units. There was particularly fierce fighting around the Djebel Mansour, from which the entire plain with the roads between Medjes Lel Bab and Pont du Fahs southwest of Tunis could be seen. Since the weak Italian garrison could not hold the mountain, we had to fight for the summit of Djebel Mansour three times. In the last attack more than half of the company, platoon and squad leaders were wounded or died. The Allies had established by mid-February a reasonably closed front in the western part of Tunisia and the fighting was intensifying. Our Rgt.Kdr. colonel Haussels was seriously wounded and died shortly afterwards in a hospital in Naples." — Gregor Seidenschwarz, With the Mountain Jaeger Regiment 756 in Africa (Tunisia), in: "The Mountain Troops - Journal of the Comrades' Circle of the Mountain Troops"

The regiment was destroyed in Tunisia in May 1943, the bulk of the team that was operational up to then was captured by the US Americans and distributed to various camps in the US

Haussels, who was fighting at the front line, urging his fighters on with the words "Let's go Jaga!", suffered a shot in the leg during the first combat mission in the Tunis bridgehead, as a result of which he (after treatment at the main dressing station and in the hospital in Tunis) was flown out and in the hospital in Italy died after leg amputation. (From metapedia.org)

Knights Cross of the Iron Cross formal award document issued to Major Arthur Haussels on parchment with an integral blank front leaf, Führerhauptquartier, September 3, 1940. The ornately lettered document is executed in India ink and gold with a hand-inked signature of Adolf Hitler at the bottom. The parchment is just the slightest bit wavy, as is very common in such documents, but otherwise fine condition. Award documents for the Knight’s Cross are rare, even though Hitler granted over 7,000 of them. A severe backlog soon developed and, in the end, very few recipients of the award ever received their large formal award documents.

The document is part of a veteran bring-back that we proudly offer here for the very first time. The GI opted to bring 9 single formal documents in one red presentation leather folder (Mappe) which will be auctioned with Ratisbon’s through a couple of auctions.