French volunteers in the Reich

Drawing of LVF soldiers storming russian positions by Henry Bossut, journalist and Stabsfeldwebel in the LVF.

Drawing of LVF soldiers storming russian positions by Henry Bossut, journalist and Stabsfeldwebel in the LVF.

Konstantine Amilakhvari (1901–1943) 🇬🇪💀 Konstantine Amilakhvari was a Georgian émigré who fled from Georgia during 1921 Soviet occupation for France. A Saint-Cyr graduate, French Foreign Legionnaire, and staunch anti-Bolshevik, he volunteered for the Legion of French Volunteers Against Bolshevism (LVF) in 1940 to fight the USSR. By October 1941, he commanded the "Hunters," a reconnaissance unit conducting intelligence and anti-partisan operations in Ukraine. Relentlessly targeted by Soviet counterintelligence (SMERSH), he evaded capture, and a Soviet plot to frame him as a double agent to the Gestapo collapsed for lack of evidence. In 1943, his vehicle was ambushed by Soviet partisans near Lviv while traveling with Gestapo officers; severely wounded, he was evacuated to Paris and died on July 4, 1943.

This document [pic 3] shows the order of production for the collar tabs [pics 1 and 2], produced in Dachau, in 1944. The collar tabs feature a sun cross, angled at 45°. Interestingly, the previous order is of a "3 arm Sonnenrad" for the flemish, which has been worn by the Langermarck, and can be seen on various pictures. The document featuring the collar tabs of many SS divisions is a page from an SS manual made for Danish volunteers (source 2), dated November 15 1944 and distributed in 1945, which would indicate that the Sun cross as an insignia for the French SS was already decided in late 1944. Another design of collar tab/insignia for the Charlemagne was the sword of Joan of Arc [pic 6], but was never ordered nor produced, it seems to have been scrapped in favor of the Sun cross. 2/2 Source | Source 2

The real insignia of the 33rd Waffen-SS division Charlemagne ? The insignia most currently associated with the Charlemagne division are the Imperial Eagle with the three Fleur de Lys, which represent a simplified version of Emperor Charlemagne's coat of arms. But what many people don’t know is that this insignia was only designed by a veteran post-war and never used by anyone during the war to refer to the Charlemagne. Instead, we can see that an insignia and collar tabs were already planned and produced for the French division of the Waffen-SS, but unfortunately never distributed to the soldiers, due to the urgency and chaos of the last year of the war. 1/2

The components of the Sturmbrigade Frankreich In 1943, the Rasse-und Siedlungshauptamt der SS (RuSHA SS) conducted a study over 157 volunteers of the Sturmbrigade Frankreich in Paris, where they were shortly stationed before leaving for training. The results were as such : Racial components : - 38% Nordic - 36% Mediterranean - 14% Dinaric - 12% Alpine - 9% have non-european admixture Other : - 54% of volunteers are aged between 17 and 20 years old - 78% of them are catholics - 62% are part of a political movement (including 20% in the PPF, the leading collaborationist party, and 10% in the French Militia, whose job was the same as the Gestapo) - 58% of them are manual workers - 25% are university students Picture : A French volunteer during training in the SS camp of Sennheim, October 1943.

Spring-summer 1944. The 1st battalion of the Sturmbrigade Frankreich is undergoing training in the SS-Truppenübungsplatz Böhmen, in Bohemia and Moravia.