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Old 06-23-2003, 12:27 PM   #1
DougD
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Digging in Stalingrad

I went digging in Stalingrad in 1998 and again last year. This is some of the stuff we (small group with permission of the city) dug up that I took home; the rest is at my fathers place. This stuff made the metal detector go crazy in every airport; the guys at the Volgograd Airport actually asked us why we wanted this stuff : )

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Old 06-23-2003, 12:38 PM   #2
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Doug,

I have some questions, if you don't mind...

1. Did the city tell you where you can dig or did you request a certain spot?
2. Did you encounter resistance to be allowed digging?
3. Was there a city official overseeing the dig?
4. How much of the items your "team" recovered was allowed to be taken out of the country?
5. What kind of items did you encounter most?

That's all for now...

Thanks,

Rusty.
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Old 06-23-2003, 01:09 PM   #3
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Nice collection!

My question - how long before we will see such items on ebay, and when will fakers move in?

Tal
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Old 06-23-2003, 01:13 PM   #4
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1. no, once you had the OK you could go where you wanted, but there are certain areas, like around Pitomnik, that are really good spots.

2. you pay= no problems

3. yes, there is only one guy (real nice guy,same in 1998 and 2002)who has official permission to dig there is actually a book with a chapter on him, i'll try to find the title but its about battlefield in Europe. Others can dig but its illegal ( difficult to enforce; we can see holes where illegals dig and then just leave the hole).

4. what you could take out depended on the customs guy at SVO when leaving the country. He went over our stuff (there were 4 of us leaving on the same flight to Vienna); pondered a bit, then let us through with no problems. 30 minutes later he just waved hundreds through without even looking at papers!

5. no question; rounds! live and spent, by the hundreds around Pitomnik; lots of unused flares too.

They do show up on E now and then, mostly dug German helmets ( I have one that I brought back; paratrooper that I bought in Moscow for $100) in reasonable condition.

One guy on our trip bought a dug german helmet that was in good shape, had been repainted, had fake decal and liner. He thought he got a "real" helmet. I did not have the heart to tell him what he really got.

DougD

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Old 07-01-2003, 12:55 PM   #5
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Digging question

Doug...
any uniform medals/badges (either side) found in your digging?
Also... what is the long item to the right of the helmet in your pic?...it looks like the stock from an MG, but I can't tell.

There is a neat email site in the internet, done by some folks who dig WW2 battlefields throughout Europe. I need to find the link, but it is a neat site to share with interested parties.

As a sidenote:
I have one Iron Cross (2nd class) that is in absolute MINT condition.... originally given to a friend of mine by a senior military official in Moscow several years ago. My friend was visiting a museum under a personal tour/visit, and this officer pulled it from a box of iron crosses in the back of the museum... all crosses were in outstanding condition. He told my friend (a fellow collector) that they were pulled from a railroad car of supplies at Stalingrad, after the surrender.

I have traveled the world, but I told my wife that it is a personal dream to make it to Volgograd.... she thinks I am an "idiot"
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Old 07-01-2003, 04:44 PM   #6
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Hello Idiot...

...just a joke; I must me a major moron as I have been there twice and would go back again.

Anyway, yes, there is a stock to an MP40 right in the middle. I found it in a trench-pit with right near the remains of a German truck. Its amazing how much you can reconstruct an area by the artifacts.

The only badges found were the iron cross, Russian para badge, and a Russian military sports badge.

There is a display in the Kiev WWII museum that has hundreds of iron crosses in a pile; a similar display is in the central armed forces museum. They must have captured 10,000!

If you can go, let me know and I'll connect you with the people with the connections.

This year the group is driving fromt he Volga to the Don to visit the old HG of the Germasn forces in the area; it supposed to be untouched!

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Old 07-01-2003, 05:14 PM   #7
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What do you do if you find human remains?


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Old 07-02-2003, 09:42 AM   #8
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///

if we find bones ( we did in 1998, not so much so in 2002) then we tend to leave them. The guy who is in charge of us there is also in charge of recovering remains, so he would come back and try to find some evidence of who it was, etc.

In 2002 he was reburying about 3 dozen new remains of Russian soldiers.

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