Burned mail from Hindenburg crash to be auctioned

A partially burned postcard recovered from the wreckage of the Hindenburg disaster will be offered for sale at the Felzmann zeppelin mail auction on March 9, 2017, in Düsseldorf.

Lot 3284 – Postcard written by Hindenburg mechanic Albert Thasler

The Thasler Postcard

The postcard was written by Hindenburg engine mechanic Albert Thasler, who often sent mail to himself and family members. Thasler was ill and not able to join Hindenburg’s last flight so he gave several pieces of mail — at least nine cards and three letters – to friend and fellow Hindenburg mechanic Robert Moser.

Moser gave the items to navigation officer Max Zabel — who also functioned as Hindenburg’s postmaster — during the flight to America. Zabel planned to cancel the items during the return flight to Germany and he stored them in Hindenburg’s post office, where they were later found amid the wreckage. Moser was in one of Hindenburg’s engineering rooms deep inside the airship at the time of the accident and died in the crash.

More than 17,000 letters and postcards were carried on Hindenburg’s last flight but only 372 were recovered from the wreckage, and they are documented in Dieter Leder‘s definitive book, LZ-129 Hindenburg Zeppelin Crash Mail (Meersburg, Germany: Topo|Verlag, 2012).

The Felzmann Auction

The Thasler postcard is among hundreds of items of zeppelin mail being offered in Auktionshaus Ulrich Felzmann’s Auction No. 158. The items are too numerous to describe here but can be viewed online.

The auction also includes a “drop bag” used to drop mail from LZ-127 Graf Zeppelin; several pieces of mail from early DELAG passenger zeppelins; postcards from Graf Zeppelin’s Polar Flight; and items sent or signed by well known zeppelin crew members including Max Pruss, Albert Sammt, and Willy Speck.