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ALL RARE 1940 WORLD WAR II ISSUES OF THE ILLUSTRATED NAZI PARTY POLITICAL LEADERSHIP MAGAZINES ‘DER HOHEITSTRÄGER’

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In the year 1940 FOUR issues of Der Hoheitsträger magazine were published. Offered on this USMBOOKS web page are all 1940 issues, Folge 1, 2, 3 und 4 with a total of 136 pages.

There was no more important magazine circulated in Nazi Germany than Der Hoheitsträger (The Standard Bearers). It was published during the Third Reich for distribution to Gauleiters, Kreisleiters and other high officials of the Nazi Party and its paramilitary organizations such as Generals of the SS, SA, NSFK, NSKK, etc. It was circulated to the Commandant and a select group of Officers at each of the Ordensburgen and to the highest ranking people in the Hitler Youth, Reichsarbeitsdienst, Deutsche Arbeitsfront, etc. - people responsible for the entire “political appearance of the Nazi Movement” within their zones (Gau, Kreis, Ortsgruppe, etc.); people representing the Nazi Party at institutions that were responsible for setting the right example and behavior, maintaining discipline and order, as well as people supervising all party members in their spheres of responsibility.  

The unquestionable organizational genius of the Nazi Party, Reichsorganisationsleiter Dr. Robert Ley, was in charge of Der Hoheitsträger, its contents and its distribution (the magazine was published only for the orientation of competent, high-ranking party leaders and issues were not to be loaned out to other persons), see picture above.

So limited was the circulation of this heavily illustrated 9 x 12-5/8 inch Nazi Party magazine that on every issue there was a serial number printed across a pad of lines on the back cover, and written in German across the bottom of the front cover of each issue was a statement that translates “Only For Service Use - Confidential”. Each of the 1940 issues of the magazines in this lot has the word Vertraulich or Confidential printed at the bottom of most of the pages!

Other articles cover the importance of the education of Nazi Party Block and Cell Leaders in their role as National Socialist Standard Bearers, National Socialist leadership in business, at the farm and at the family level, social programs for the elderly, Dr. Ley’s big social plans for after the end of the war, comparisons of price regulations during the first year of World War I and World War II, and there is also an article by Gauinspekteur Merzenich about the benefits for managers of portable writing folios.

Above, the illustration that accompanies content about social programs for the elderly that create a “foundation for the German future”.

Above, the announcement that on 12 May 1940 Leutnant Alfred Himstedt had died while involved in a battle at the Maginot Line. Himstedt was the author of Das Programm der NSDAP wird erfüllt!, the publication about the fulfillment of the basic principles and goals of the Nazi Party.

Issue 3 of Der Hoheitsträger has very interesting information on foreign citizens living in individual Nazi Ortsgruppen. Chapters cover how to deal with them (“NO mixing!”), the dangers of race mixing not only for German racial purity but also for the health of the German population in general, as well as the importance of the German language.

There are many pictures and illustrations that accompany the articles in these World War II Hoheitsträger magazines: Adolf Hitler with Dr. Robert Ley, a Conrad Hommel oil painting of Adolf Hitler displayed at the 1940 Greater German Art Exhibition in Munich, an oil painting of the House of German Art, Gauleiter Erich Koch of Gau Ostpreussen with citizens, many examples of decorated Nazi Feldpost letters from soldiers serving at the front, soldier jokes, RAD volunteers and “weekend warriors” helping farmers with the harvest, Hitler dining with members of his old Regiment, an enormous Christmas tree on Unter Den Linden in Berlin, etc., etc.

Each issue contains letters from Kreisleiter and Ortsgruppenleiter to the editor of Der Hoheitsträger, technical and organizational news, results of individual law matters, announcements about he deaths of Nazi Party members, reviews of new books, patriotic Hitler quotes, etc.

The very hard-core and controversial Nazi nature of the content of these Hoheitsträger magazines is the reason that most examples were sought out and destroyed at the end of the Third Reich and World War II by Allied denazification commissions. Their controversial content was also used as a principal element by the prosecution in their effort to convict Dr. Robert Ley and others at the International War Crimes Trials in Nürnberg.

Any issue of Der Hoheitsträger is highly collectible. Finding a complete year published during World War II as the one offered on this USMBOOKS web page, is exceeding rare especially in this fine condition!

After decades in an archive in the High Plains Desert climate of the Black Hills in western South Dakota, these carefully stored 84 year old World War II magazines are perfectly dry and have no offensive odor. All 1940 issues in this lot are in very good used condition. Please note that Folge 1 and Folge 2 have professional replacement back covers. Issue 3 and 4 have original Third Reich back covers with serial number 21653 and 13716 respectively. The December 1940 issue has a name handwritten on the front cover.

These rare 1940 issues of Der Hoheitsträger have articles by Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess about new regulations for Wehrmacht soldiers pertaining to Feldpost as well as other articles about Soldatenbetreuung. Welfare for frontline soldiers, reading material for frontline soldiers, art exhibitions organized by the KdF in military facilities, services for family members of military personnel in the homeland through local Nazi Party Ortsgruppen. There is also an article about the exemplary role soldiers have at the front as National Socialist Standard Bearers as Party principles were to be followed during war time as well (Schulung auch im Krieg)!

Issue 4 (index shown above) starts with a patriotic excerpt from a speech by Hitler, followed by “Christmas Words 1940” by Franz Hermann Woweries, a German politician and Gaupresseamtsleiter and Gaupropagandaleiter der NSDAP in Hessen-Nassau. Woweries’ writing was so overtly National Socialist, that his work was put on the list of “Rejected Literature” in the Soviet Zone of Occupation of Germany after the end of World War II!