The German Soldier smell

Although this quote was from the Battle of Verdun (WW1), I believe it was mentioned in this thread that a similar smell existed then as well.

...the latrines cause major problems. They are completely blocked up and smell terribly. This stench is fought with chlorinated lime and this smell mixes with the battlefield smell of decomposition. Men even wear their gas masks when using the latrines…

Witnesses of Verdun

I really don't know what kind of smell this would produce, it may not have been a problem everywhere but certainly some camps/outposts may have suffered a similar problem during WW2.

 

...the latrines cause major problems. They are completely blocked up and smell terribly. This stench is fought with chlorinated lime and this smell mixes with the battlefield smell of decomposition. Men even wear their gas masks when using the latrines…


Nothing changes then it was like that in Iraq

 

Yet another veteran remembers the smell, taken from 'A Trooper's Tale' by Cecil Newton. He was a Gunner/operator in Shermans with the 4/7th DG. Here, remembering a blockhouse on the beach on D-Day.The air was still thick with concrete dust and the smell of Germans. They had a peculiar odour which lingered everywhere they had been in occupation. It was noticed throughout the campaign and was thought to be the gun oil they used.

 

I am reading The Last Ridge, by Jenkins McKay, a book about the US 10th Mountain Division, it's formation, training and combat in Italy. It is a good, well written book and I have enjoyed it. It's only fault is the poor maps, which I have found to be a common complaint with similar books.

On page 229, one of the men describes the scent of the German soldier this way:

"Kennerly smelled what he had come to recognize as the emblematic odor of the German soldier-a mix between damp earth and a new puppy-that he was sure he could notice from thirty yards away."

 

Slipdigit -
The main problem with "The Last Ridge" - not the book - the actual Ridge was that the Germans always took it back with them - they never ran out of them !

Cheers

 

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Re the German soldier smell
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Re affirming what others on the forum have written there was no particular group or branch they all had the same smell sometimes even advantageous to men going on patrols that were downwind of Germans that were around but there was a smell that haunted me and just to think of it makes me feel sick that was when flamethrowers were used and the smell of men being roasted alive in their uniforms and boots the smell never left your nostrils not for days but for weeks afterwards you seemed to taste it American J.D Salinger author of the novel “Catcher in the Rye” served in the US military in France in world war two and told his daughter “you never get the smell of burning flesh out of your nose entirely no matter how long you live” and I would second that statement sorry if I have gone off thread slightly but as Sapper said these smells stay with you forever
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Regards niccar

 

Some powerful recollections in this thread! - respect to Tom and Ron.

For what it's worth I'm with the 'leather theory'.
Firstly:
In the late 80s, early 90s I watched a documentary on tv filmed by a US Army film crew recruited from Hollywood with latest colour equipment. (I had it on video - now sadly lost). They landed at Normandy and progressed through France and into Germany, meeting the advancing the Russian Army and eventually ending up at Hitler's Berghoff. However on the way they were met with large numbers of surrendering German troops who were referred to as having a really strong sour smell which was attributed to the cheap tanning processes of their leather boots, belts, braces etc.
Secondly:
In the days before the UK gun ban I had a P38 pistol, given to me by the widow of an army major, the holster of which had an almost indescribable heady, bitter, sour smell quite unlike anything else I could liken it to.
Humbly,
Tom.

 

Let me say again, this German smell was a Sweet perfumed pungent smell, Never to be forgotten and we could sometimes smell him near when conditions were right.
Sapper

 

night patrols during that time were made easy by smelling the wet uniforms of the german army that were near by

 

Hi,
just finished reading Carlo D'Este's 'Warlord'. He tells a fascinating story of Churchill, Smuts etc. visiting Montgomery somewhere in Normandy. Smuts turned to the security Captain and said that he could smell Germans. He was assured that the area had been cleared. A day later two German paratroopers hiding in nearby bushes surrendered.
Just think if they had shot down Churchill, Montgomery etc. and how about that for a sense of smell.

Len

 

Let me say again, this German smell was a Sweet perfumed pungent smell, Never to be forgotten and we could sometimes smell him near when conditions were right.
Sapper

Pungent as in good? Or pungent as in bad?

night patrols during that time were made easy by smelling the wet uniforms of the german army that were near by

Well like stated before there is the possibility that all sides had a unique smell, of course to their "own kind" it wouldn't be noticeable.

 

I'm sure the Maori btn. were particually bad, not meaning to be racist or anything.

 

Pungent; as in "Heavy in the air" for the want of a better description. Not a terrible smell, for it was scented. But it was penetrating and had "depth" Often found where the enemy had been, in dugouts, or places they had constructed for a bit of "Home Comfort"

It may be 65 years on ...But I can still smell it today, never forgotten!
Cheers
sapper

 

Whilst I can add no new theories as to the "German" smell described by the fellas, I can say that the smell of a decomposing corpse is one that you never forget!! Having had to spend many an hour in the same room as some poor unfortunate who has been dead for several days or even weeks I can categorically say you do not forget that smell! Obviously my experience of this is nothing compared to what our veterans had to endure but I can understand how they are able to differentiate between the two.

 

I've also read that in The Great War the Germans had a particular smell too..

many French veterans of the Great War recount this occurance...one example (with a possible explaination) appears in an accumulation of veteran's first hand accounts that was originally published between 1915 and 1928... "...An unbearable smell of sweat and tallow grabbed my throat, the characteristic smell of the wounded German soldier, caused by the waterproof qualities of his clothing that trapped the sweat..." (Bernard A.)

Dave.

(and I bet that them frenchies smelled just simply lovely didn't they! LOL)

 

once again thanks sapper

 

From today's Sun:

'Whiffy Germans are wurst lovers' | The Sun |News


Tom.

 

You certainly don't need a second sniff to recognise rotting humanity! Nor of a Turkish wrestler's jockstrap
But nobody has mentioned the contribution made by tobacco or the characteristic smell of the concrete in the Atlantic Wall bunkers and emplacements.
Even today, to me, each foreign air terminal building has a recognisable odour - mainly due to foreign tobacco smoke; and landing almost anywhere in the tropics I'm always struck by the smell of damp, newly turned earth.

 

I've heard that smell is the strongest trigger of memory.

Got my nursey head on with this one:
Patients with Altzeimers have a good long term memory, but a very poor short term memory. Scent/odour/smell therapy works to trigger the long term memory, with the theory that the more we exercise the long term memory that it will benefit the short term memory.

Anyone been to Eden camp - the smell of carbolic soap, coal in the bunker, engine oil in the submarine - all smells produced to trigger 'nostalgia'

Death and buring flesh have distinctive smells that trigger the memory.
I have friends who are falkands/ gulf one vets, and they are triggered by the same group of smells. The viet cong could track the US army initially in the early stages of jungle insertion - cos the yanks used spearmint toothpaste (mint isnt native to the jungle, therefore easily identified).

PTSD sufferers are triggered by roast pork - it smells and looks/feels like flesh - again the smell sets of a chain reaction of memories.

Many things have distinctive smells - I know when a patient has C Diff bowel infection (rotten cabbage smell) or has maleana (bloody stools) because they are very distinctive.

My good friend Alan was the senior RMP during the falklands, they all lived on rations. His memory of port stanley was of the bodies in the streets - and the smell of new made bread when the bakers got up and running after the liberation.
If you read up on shopping psychology (yes there is such a thing) - the smell of newly baked bread is a sales winner, as it stimulates shoppers memories and they actually buy more than in stores without a bakery!

And there is nothing like the smell of a bacon butty, which is why im signing off and heading to the canteen. B)

 

Ah, on the subject of bacon sarnies

They were used to great effect by a small 'elite' force during the strangeways prison riot in manchester -

prisoners barrocaded at one end of a corridor, a 'chef' with a burner and frying pan hidden just out of sight at the other end, and a snatch team ten feet away from the chef - just imagine being a very hungery rioter, and you get the whiff of bacon in your nosterils, tempting isnt it