Liliput Baureihe 42 1800 DR, Ep.II Tarnfarbe - Review

QUOTE (60134 @ 20 Jul 2008, 04:20) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>And yet it this month's Railway magazine (I think) there was a Drajeeling B Class with a swastika emblazoned on the smokebox.... One has to remember that the symbol pre-dated the Nazis by thousands of years and is a sacred sign in India.

Ho hum!

60134
The swastika is used widely in India, Nepal and elsewhere in the east as it an ancient religious symbol. This is often not known in the west and misinterpreted. I remember seeing an Indian Air Force Spitfire from the thirties with a swastika emblem on the squadron badge.

It's quite interesting about the application of the swastika on the side of the locos. Guardian covers it pretty well above, quite a few 50 class locos ran with the eagle+swastika emblem on the cab side and I guess that this was because most were produced during the war and it was a good time to use the new engine/propaganda theme. Many in normal service in Germany could be thus found.

As mentioned, many of the 'prestige' locos were also so equipped, and the beautiful castings made for the front of the new diesel 'Schnelltriebwagen' (SVT 137 bauart Koeln) were very elaborate. I also think you'll find that any engines that went anywhere near the eastern fronts also had the emblem painted on for propaganda purposes. Thus after the broadgauge was converted to standard right down to Odessa and the Crimea you will find 57 class 0-10-0 locos and even the lowly G7.1 0-8-0 locos (the subject of the recent Piko hobby series) running with the eagle+swastika painted on the cab side.

If you want to see some excellent pictures on anything from the 1930s until 1960s I'll direct you to an amazing, astounding, recently published collection of work by Walter Hollnagel, who was an official railway photographer based in Hamburg for this whole period. This work is the ModellEisenbahner SPEZIAL #9 published first in November 2007, it's called 'Reichsbahn, Krieg and Wirtschaftwunder' and it's only Euro 6.50 - I recommend it to you all. You will not believe the quality of the colour photography from the 30s and 40s.

6991

QUOTE (6991 @ 20 Jul 2008, 20:27) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>If you want to see some excellent pictures on anything from the 1930s until 1960s I'll direct you to an amazing, astounding, recently published collection of work by Walter Hollnagel, who was an official railway photographer based in Hamburg for this whole period. This work is the ModellEisenbahner SPEZIAL #9 published first in November 2007, it's called 'Reichsbahn, Krieg and Wirtschaftwunder' and it's only Euro 6.50 - I recommend it to you all. You will not believe the quality of the colour photography from the 30s and 40s.

6991
Sold, I have been very impressed with the information in the ModelEisenbahn Journals. At 6.50 Euro, I'll have to get one of these.