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Archiver > GEN-DE > 2000-03 > 0952121397


From: "Barbara und Karl-Heinz Fleck" <>
Subject: Re: Can anyone read this
Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 23:09:57 +0100


Henning Boettcher <> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag: 89k3n1$3pb$1@news1.sunrise.ch...
> The text is in the attachment (I hope your computer can read it) .
> The text should be read by an Austrian military person, because there are
> abbreviations I don't know and a word (Strafgast) that is very doubtful to
> me.
> --
>
> Regards
> Henning Boettcher
> Switzerland

Dear Henning,
I think the abbreviations are "M(atrose) 3. Cl(asse)" (seaman 3rd class) and so on.
The word you found out to be "Strafgast" is hard to read, indeed. The syllable "...gast" is right for sure.
In the German and Austrian navy this additive was used to describe a naval soldier with a specialized
education or task, for example "Signalgast" or "Bootsgast". I'd read "Maaßgast" and I could imagine that this was
a person who was qualified for measuring the distances to military targets. This would fit to the fact that
the owner of this pay-book was trained as a naval gunner as mentioned two lines above. Unfortunately
I couldn't confirm this kind of reading interpretation by an encyclopedia, but maybe one of our fellow researches
knows this expression.

Regards
Karl-Heinz Fleck
Kamen, Germany

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