[Leica] Leica during WW2

[lrzeitlin at aol.com (Lawrence Zeitlin)]

Marc,

<<
COMMENT:  No!  A thousand times no.  The facts were laid out to me by the
late Tink Ewald, then the photographer for the US Engineer Battalion which
captured the plant.  This is not to disparage the many contributions both
to social consciousness and to the Leitz camera works made by Else (note
spelling) Leitz.  A cousin of hers, Henri Dumur, was the business manager
of hte plant during the War Years.  He simply hoisted a Swiss flag and this
caused the battalion commander to ask for instructions from his higher
headquarters.>>

=======

Thanks for your clarification of Leica's WW2 history. I got much of my 
information on the Leica situation directly from Emil Keller in the late 
'80s when I was doing a study on the effectiveness or lack of 
effectiveness of WW2 bombing on military production. WW2 was a half 
century ago and memories change or fade. But we differ on some points. 
In his 1988 book "The Leica Years, 1945-1980" Keller writes,

"Wetzlar was liberated in March 1945 by the American Army advancing 
East. . . . The city was to make a last ditch stand by children and old 
men who had been conscripted into a military defense unit. Dr. Elsie 
Leitz persuaded the authorities otherwise and, when the first American 
detachment approached, she took it on herself to inform the commander 
that there would be no effort madt to resist, and the occupation 
proceded without further bloodshed."

I believe Keller was in the U.S. Army in England and France at the time 
of Wetzlar's occupation and was not directly on the scene so his 
accounting is not that an eye witness. His source of information was 
apparently Else Leitz.

Dr. Henri Dumur was, in fact, a Swiss citizen as well as being the 
accounting and inventory control manager for Leitz. His flying of the 
Swiss flag may well have been a personal statement. According to Keller, 
Dumur had a rather unconventional way of doing things and served as the 
principal negotiator between Leitz and the occupation authorities.

Although some Leica IIIc cameras were available in the US prior to WW2, 
you are right in stating that most of those assembled from spare parts 
by Leitz, NY were earlier models. I believe that most were IIIb rather 
than IIIa cameras. I personally have a Leica IIIb assembled by Leitz, NY 
during WW2 with a U.S. Signal Corps engraving. My favorite "retro" Leica 
user camera is one of those immediate postwar IIIc cameras #415xxx. I 
don't know if it was sold in a PX or traded for a few cartons of 
cigarettes but it still works fine. With a collapsible Elmar lens, it 
will go where few other Leicas can go, i.e. into a pocket. In two more 
years it will be old enought to collect Social Security. With the 
Wollensak 90 mm lens from the Signal Corps camera set and a Canon 35 mm 
lens, it was my travel Leica kit for many years.

By the way, does Zeiss still run the sex shop? That might be more 
profitable than being in the film camera business today.

Larry Z