The ESPC's World War One Collection

The first of a multi-part series about picture postcards from what contemporaries called "The Great War" (and their descendants have taken to number)

Every now and then, we must also address less-than-cheerful topics in these pages, and today marks the first of such postings. Today, we’ll begin a conversation about the picture postcards from the First World War in the Erich Sonntag Postcard Collection.

I do not think it is per se necessary to state the obvious: “war is a racket” (US Marine Corps Gen. Smedley Butler) once said, and there is nothing to make this an easy topic.

The picture postcards I found among the file labelled “War” are—harrowing, eery, and sad, for they are but snapshots in time informing a recipient of the receipt of a letter, of (still) being alive, or of “other” circumstances that were deemed “o.k.” by wartime censors.

We have already begun discussing some of the “war”-themed picture postcards when we travelled to the Austrian Museum of Military History a few days ago:

A 1970s Trip to the Museum

Today, we’ll travel a bit further back in time.

Postcards from the First World War

Among the more standardised picture postcards in the Erich Sonntag Postcard Collection are these “official” specimen from the Red Cross, here no. 573:

All of the postcards reproduced below were never mailed, but I think you should see at least one of their reverse sides, which gives the theme: “silent heroism”.

Other motives of these series are…well, you be the judge.

No. 553 (above): “From the Army’s Golden Book, series V: infantryman Georg Caspar of the 5th Infantry Regt. leaves, the last of the five women saved by him in his arms, the burning house before it collapses.” (You may buy that one here.)

No. 576 (above): “From the Army’s Golden Book, series V: there existed a standing order to collect the rifles of all fallen. A forgotten Werndl-Holub Rifle is now recovered by Sgt. Haas who, surprising the enemy, escapes by bike under fire.”

No. 575: “From the Army’s Golden Book, series V: military chaplain [orig. Feldkurat] Emil Boscarolli administers the last rites to a fellow comrade from the Trento Regiment [orig. Trientiner Regt.] after having been wounded himself and providing first aid to another one.”

No. 495: “From the Army’s Golden Book, series V: Heinrich Rösler, Vormeister [Pvt. First Class/Lance Corporal] of the Field Howitzer Division No. 13 served with cold-blooded stoicism under heave enemy fire until he suffered a hero’s death while doing his duty.”

Post-Script

In one of her recent email messages, Dr. Aneta Pavlenko (hi!) wrote the following lines in response to my recent first foray into the life and times of Erich Sonntag:

The bare facts of his trajectory do not say much about his inner world and his insatiable curiosity about the outer world. Collectors I meet at shows are invariably either dedicated travelers who bring postcards back as mementos and curios or dreamers who use the colorful ephemera as a substitute for the trips they’d like to make. This of course pertains only to those who collect international postcards - there are numerous people who collect only stuff pertaining to their native towns or narrow themes, from Christmas to fishes to railway stations. 

While the overwhelming majority of picture postcards in his collection show places in post-war Austria, there is a sizeable contingent of postcards that show “lost places”, such as the areas formerly inhabited by German-speakers who were ethnically cleansed after the end of hostilities in May 1945. Since Erich Sonntag was in touch with the small, if lively, “scene” of postcard collectors in Austria, these may have been acquired at backyard sales, at flea markets, or the like.

Yet, there are also quite a few postcards and photographs that show military hardware, which I think is explainable by his profession—Erich Sonntag was, above all, a soldier, as well as by, in part, memories of his military service during the Second World War. I have seen picture postcards from his in-laws who also served in the Wehrmacht, and these may have ended up in his collection. Perhaps because his (and mine) in-laws knew he collected them, perhaps because they also knew that Erich Sonntag would not throw them away.

Whatever the true reason(s), I now have these war-themed picture postcards, and every now and then I shall post some of them.

In the meantime: let’s all say a prayer for those who died in war.