Wartime Memorabilia 

Rod, like many people who had endured six years of service in the forces, collected a number of significant items that reminded them of what had happened to them. Rod “liberated” some items from one of the “E boats” that his boat had damaged and then had subsequently sunk. During my late teenage years I wore the grey leather sea going suit that Rod "liberated" from one of the E boats when riding my Lambretta scooter in the 60's. "Bunny" Lacome mentions a pair of sea boots he acquired suggesting that they may have come from the same wardrobe! I left the suit behind when I got married and I believe my father gave it to a collector of uniforms.

When an MGB or MTB sunk an “E boat” they asked the base staff to make them a swastika out of a shell case and then mounted it on the side of the bridge of their boat. Rod kept both of the brass swastikas from the sinking of S 202 and S703 sunk by MTB 482.

I am not sure which “E boat” the binoculars came from S202 or S703 but he used them throughout his life never buying another pair. I have used them on many occasions in the past and now have them. They were made by Carl Zeiss from Jena (7x50) and show the serial number 2076669.

 The binoculars are in a condition that one would expect after a number of years of vigorous war service and sixty odd years of subsequent continual use. However they still give a prefect image albeit looking a little bit "tired"

 The name of the German sailor was removed from the white disc on the left and Rod inserted his own name and rank. We therefore do not know the name of the original owner.

The name Carl Zeiss Jena has the capital letter "T" above it and the Swastika has an "M" to the left of it and on the right what looks like the Roman numeral IV (4) followed by a slash(/) and a number 1.

James Stewart from Northern Ireland sent me the following facts about the binoculars, he researched the information from Dr Hans Seeger's "Grey Book", "Militarische Fernglaser und Fernrohre in Heer, Luftwaffe und Marine" (2002 Edition).

The markings you describe are the Kriegsmarine acceptance codes; the eagle over “M” with “IV/1”. The “T” means the lens have been coated. Your set dates from March 1940 one of a batch of 1000 made within that month.

Thank you James, he left message number 20 in the Guest Book entries.

The laundry/clothes list came from S 205 of the 4^th S Boat flotilla. If you are reading this and can correctly understand German I would welcome a translation.

One of his “trophies” is a book acquired from a sailor from one of the two “E boats” that came to Felixstowe on the 13^thMay 1945. The book has the title FEUER und FARBE and was published in 1943. There are over 150 drawings but because of the rather poor condition of the book and the time it would take to scan all of the pages I have copied only a few. Unfortunately there are not any pictures of German Coastal Forces boats. I have chosen some of the most well known of the people featured in the book. Names of the individual people are Adolf Hitler, Generaloberst Dietl, Generaloberst Guderian and Generalfeldmarshall Rommel there also drawings of Dunkirk and Bombing of England.