Description
One of the most unique pieces I picked up in a recent veteran lot of items brought home by Pvt. Emil J. Polashek of the 411th Infantry Regiment, Headquarters Company was this SS rubber document stamp. This stamp belonged to the SS High Mountain Training School in Austria. After doing some research I found online it turned into a great history lesson….
The Neustift im Stubaital subcamp of Dachau, also known as Innsbruck II, was located in the Tyrolian Mountains of present-day Austria, roughly 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) south of the city of Innsbruck. It was the most southern of all Dachau subcamps. The camp was established in a small SS barracks camp (Barackenlager) that had been built in 1940 for the construction of a road between the Stubai Valley (Stubaital) and the Ötz Valley (Ötztal). However, the camp remained empty until October 10, 1942, when it became a subcamp of Dachau and was officially opened and redesigned the SS-Alpine Training Facility and Prisoner Camp (Hochsgebirgsausbildungs- und Gefangenenlager).
The 411th reached Innsbruck, Austria and made contact with the U.S. Fifth Army at the Brenner Pass on May 4, 1945, closing off German withdrawal routes. This is when he would’ve picked up this stamp. This is not some European reproduction, this is a textbook original item and very rare to find especially with ties to the SS and their camp systems!
