Secret Field Police, Bad-Nauheim Geheime Feldpolizei, Bad Nauheim (Fond 1369)

The Geheime Feldpolizei (Secret Field Police) or GFP was the secret military police of the German Wehrmacht until the end of the Second World War. These units were used to carry out plain-clothed security work in the field such as counter-espionage, counter-sabotage, detection of treasonable activities, counter-propaganda, protecting military installations and the provision of assistance to the German Army in courts-martial investigations. GFP personnel, who were also classed as Abwehrpolizei, operated as an executive branch of German military intelligence detecting resistance activity in Germany and occupied France. They were also known to carry out torture and executions of prisoners. The Geheime Feldpolizei was commanded by the Heerespolizeichef (Chief of Army Police), who initially had the equivalent military rank of major. Subordinate to the Heerespolizeichef, but equivalent to the rank of major, was the Feldpolizeidirektor who was in charge of a GFP unit or Gruppe. On 24 July 1939, the title of Heerespolizeichef was upgraded to the military rank of Oberst. After the war, the police organizations of Nazi Germany like the Gestapo and the Order Police (Orpo) Battalions were classified as criminal in their general disposition for the wide array of crimes they committed.

Rossiĭskiĭ gosudarstvennyĭ voennyĭ arkhiv

Forms part of the Claims Conference International Holocaust Documentation Archive at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. This archive consists of documentation whose reproduction and/or acquisition was made possible with funding from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.

Source of acquisition is the Russian State Military Archive (Rossiĭskiĭ gosudarstvennyĭ voennyĭ arkhiv), Osobyi Archive, Fond 1369. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Archives received the filmed collection via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum International Archival Programs Division in 2004.