Armin Scheiderbauer: Adventures in My Youth

Ersatz – Replacement

Etappenschweine – lit. ‘Rear-area pigs’, contemptuous term used by frontline soldiers for men who populated rear-area postings avoiding seeing action

Fahnenjunkerunteroffizier – Non-commissioned officer cadet

Feldgendarmerie – Field police

Feldwebel – Sergeant

Festung – Fortress, or more usually referring to a ‘fortified place’

Gebirgsjäger – Mountain troops

Gefreiter – Lance-corporal

General der Artillerie – General of artillery

Generalfeldmarschall – Field Marshall

General der Infanterie – General of infantry

Generalleutnant – Lieutenant-General

Generalmajor – Major-General

Generaloberst – General

Hauptfeldwebel – Senior sergeant

Hauptmann – Captain

Heeresgruppe – Army group

Heimatschuss – Soldiers’ term for a wound that would require its recipient to be shipped home for treatment

Heimatkehrer – lit. ‘Homecomers’, used to refer to German soldiers returning from captivity after WWII

Hilfsarbeiter – Labourer, possibly foreign

Hilfswilliger – Auxiliary, usually non-Germans assisting military formations in a non-combat capacity

Hochdeutsch – lit. ‘high German’, equivalent of ‘the Queen’s English’

Infanteriegeschütz – Infantry gun

Kampfgruppe – Battle group

Kreis – Administrative region, approximately equivalent to a county in size

Kreisstadt – Chief town in a Kreis

Kübelwagen – Jeep, command car

Landesschützen – Regional defence troops

Landser – Nickname for German soldiers, equivalent to the British ‘Tommy’ or US ‘G.I.’

Leutnant – Lieutenant

Marschbataillon – Personnel replacement transfer battalion

Nebelwerfer – Rocket launcher

Oberfähnrich – Officer candidate

Oberfeldwebel – Master sergeant

Obergefreiter – Corporal

Oberleutnant – First lieutenant

Oberst – Colonel

Oberstleutnant – Lieutenant-colonel

Panzer Abteilung – Tank battalion

Panzerjäger – Tank hunter

Ratschbum – German slang term for the Soviet 76mm gun

SS-Unterscharführer – SS sergeant

SS-Untersturmführer – SS second lieutenant

Stadtkreis – District formed by a town

Stahlhelm – Steel helmet

Stellungsbaustab – Trench construction staff

Sturmgeschütz – Assault gun

Sturmgewehr – Assault rifle

Unteroffizier – NCO/sergeant

Volk – lit. ‘People’ but in German the term encompasses a pseudo-mystical reference to the way that the people, the land they live in etc. are inextricably linked

Volksartilleriecorps – People’s artillery corps

Volksgrenadier – People’s grenadier

Volkssturm – German equivalent of the Home Guard

Wehrkreis – Military area/district, a German administrative area for military purposes

Barbarossa Derailed: The Battle for Smolensk 10 July–10 September 1941 Volume 1: The German Advance, The Encirclement Battle, and the First and Second Soviet Counteroffensives, 10 July-24 August 1941

David M. Glantz

ISBN 9781907677502

Mussolini’s War. Fascist Italy’s Military Struggles from Africa and Western Europe to the Mediterranean and Soviet Union 1935–45

Frank Joseph

ISBN 9781907677519

Penalty Strike. The Memoirs of a Red Army Penal Company Commander 1943–45 (Soviet Memoirs of War Vol 1)

Alexander V. Pyl’cyn

ISBN 9781907677533

Red Star Airacobra. Memoirs of a Soviet Fighter Ace 1941–45 (Soviet Memoirs of War Vol 2)

Evgeniy Mariinskiy

ISBN 9781907677540

Over Fields of Fire. Flying the Sturmovik in Action on the Eastern Front 1942–45 (Soviet Memoirs of War Vol 3)

Anna Timofeeva-Egorova

ISBN 9781907677557

Secrets of the Cold War. US Army Europe’s Intelligence & Counterintelligence Activities against the Soviets during the Cold War

Leland C. McCaslin

ISBN 9781907677526

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Published by Helion & Company Limited 2003

Paperback reprint 2010

eBook edition 2011

Designed and typeset by Helion & Company Limited, Solihull, West Midlands

Cover designed by Bookcraft Limited, Stroud, Gloucestershire

Printed by Henry Ling Ltd, Dorchester, Dorset

This English edition © Helion and Company 2003

Hardcover ISBN 9781874622062

Paperback ISBN 9781906033774

Digital ISBN 9781907677496

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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