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| - The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (German: Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes) and its variants were the highest award in the military of the Third Reich. During or shortly after World War II, 457 German servicemen of the Waffen-SS, including volunteers and conscripts from Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, France, Hungary, Latvia, Netherlands and Norway, received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. Of these, 411 presentations were formally made and evidence of the award is still available in the German National Archives. One recipient, Hermann Fegelein, was court-martialed and executed on 29 April 1945. According to German law he was deprived of rank and all awards previously. Fegelein must therefore be considered a de facto but not de jure recipient. A further 46 Knight's Cross, 8 Kn
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| abstract
| - The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (German: Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes) and its variants were the highest award in the military of the Third Reich. During or shortly after World War II, 457 German servicemen of the Waffen-SS, including volunteers and conscripts from Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, France, Hungary, Latvia, Netherlands and Norway, received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. Of these, 411 presentations were formally made and evidence of the award is still available in the German National Archives. One recipient, Hermann Fegelein, was court-martialed and executed on 29 April 1945. According to German law he was deprived of rank and all awards previously. Fegelein must therefore be considered a de facto but not de jure recipient. A further 46 Knight's Cross, 8 Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and 4 Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords recipients are either lacking the evidence to sustain their listings or received the award under questionable legal terms. However, all of them were accepted by the Association of Knight's Cross Recipients (Ordensgemeinschaft der Ritterkreuzträger des Eisernen Kreuzes e.V.) as legitimate recipients. The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross and its higher grades were based on four enactments. The first enactment Reichsgesetzblatt I S. 1573 of 1 September 1939 instituted the Iron Cross and the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. As the war progressed, some of the recipients distinguished themselves further and a higher grade, the Oak Leaves to Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub) was instituted. The Oak Leaves, as they were commonly referred to, were based on the enactment Reichsgesetzblatt I S. 849 of 3 June 1940. In 1941, two higher grades of the Knight's Cross were instituted. The enactment Reichsgesetzblatt I S. 613 of 28 September 1941 introduced the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub und Schwertern) and the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub, Schwertern und Brillanten). At the end of 1944, the last and final grade, the Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit goldenem Eichenlaub, Schwertern und Brillanten), based on the enactment Reichsgesetzblatt 1945 I S. 11 of 29 December 1944, concluded the variants of the Knight's Cross. The Oberkommando der Wehrmacht kept separate Knight's Cross lists, one for each of the three military branches, Heer (Army), Kriegsmarine (Navy), Luftwaffe (Air force) and for the Waffen-SS. Within each of these lists a unique sequential number was assigned to each recipient. The same numbering paradigm was applied to the higher grades of the Knight's Cross, one list per grade.
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