11/02/2026
Documented Order of the “Patriotic War, 1st Class” № 307146, awarded to a GERMAN National and former Soviet Partisan, Scherhag Hans (Шерхаг Ганс) [pictured, together with Captain Beydlin, from the book “№ 238 - With special assignment to Pskov”] on 6 May 1970 - 25 years after the end of the WW2 - together with the “Partisan of Leningrad” Badge and the Anniversary Medal “Forty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945” a Medal and Certificate to a Non Soviet Citizen.
The files for the Soviet Partisans remain classified (along with the majority of the SMERSH / NKVD personnel), thus conducting research for this award is very difficult. The only available information for Scherhag can be found in the books “№ 238 - With special assignment to Pskov” by Frank Schumann, and “Epiphany" by Mikhail Burtsev Ivanovich, which states:
“The ideological impact on the enemy was also carried out from the partisan movement in the territory of the Leningrad Region, as well as in the areas of Pskov and Novgorod. The propaganda brigade, led by Captain V. L. Martens (the son of the well-known revolutionary Leninist, L. K. Martens, a party member since 1893), was operating successfully in these areas. The political department of the North-Western Front formed this brigade back in September 1943. It consisted of Captain I. A. Beydlin, a senior instructor from the 7th Department of the front’s political department and a group of anti-fascist prisoners, among them, Corporal Hans Scherhag, the head of the group and his assistant, Private Rudolf Blayl. Both are from the working class and are graduates of the anti-fascist school. (Scherhag went over to the side of the Red Army voluntarily, fulfilling the order of his father.)
The propaganda brigade had the task of delivering a letter from the vice-president of the " NKFD" (Nationalkomitee Freies Deutschland - National Committee for a Free Germany), General von Seydlitz, to the commander of Army Group North, General Kühler. Seydlitz urged Kühler to go along with his troops on the side of the NKFD. The brigade also had instructions to create underground anti-fascist organisations in enemy units and to issue leaflets to German soldiers and officers.
On the night of 7 December, one Li-2 (Lisunov Li-2) aircraft crossed the front line and dropped propagandists by parachute exactly in the given area - the location of the 7th Partisan Brigade. The commander of the 7th Partisan Brigade, A. V. Alekseev, and the Commissar, A. F. Maiorov, warmly greeted the new fighters and helped them with all the necessary means for their work.
Pretty soon, it became known that the German command was very concerned about the presence on their rear of our Propaganda Brigade, especially the anti-fascist group. One of the captured documents - a regular edition of the “All-Arms Bulletin” (“Algemeine Heesresmitteylungen”) began directly with a formidable warning: “Attention! Soviet parachutist agents!” Of course, the true motives of the German patriots were distorted; they were called traitors, spies and saboteurs. The task was to take them alive, and they asked to be "immediately deported back to the Reich Main Security Office in Berlin……
….. I learned more about the work of the anti-fascists directly from Captain Martens when the 7th Partisan Brigade united with the forward units of the advancing Red Army, and Wilhelm Ludvigovich returned to Moscow. A description of our conversation is recorded in my diary on 29 March. During the nearly four months the propagandists and anti-fascists spent with the partisans, they participated in all the combat action with the 7th Brigade. The anti-fascists visited Porkhov and Pskov on multiple occasions; the information they delivered, particularly regarding garrison morale, was highly accurate and comprehensive. It was written in a lot of leaflets - small in size, but substantive and genuine. They announced the defeat of individual Regiments and Divisions of the 18th German Army, tens of thousands killed and maimed. The leaflets were multiplied on a typewriter and distributed among the soldiers who went to the front line to replace those who killed.
But it was not possible to create anti-fascist groups within the enemy units. Captain Martens explained this by the fact that German regiments and battalions were often replaced, hurriedly leaving the area of partisan operations. Nevertheless, he believed that the creation of anti-fascist groups was a pressing task; all that was needed was to continue sending propaganda brigades to the enemy's rear.
Martens spoke warmly about the three anti-fascists who died carrying out an important mission - unfortunately, I did not write down their names -, and he said Hans Scherhag and Rudolf Blil rescued the seriously wounded Captain Beydlin*….
……I must add that in July 1944, Scherhag and Blil operated as part of the anti-fascist group behind enemy lines in the territory of Belarus. After the war, they became "activists of the first hour" - the so-called anti-fascists in East Germany - the first participants to build socialism on German soil……”
*On 11 February 1944, there was a fight near the station of Toroschino and Scherhag; together with Rudi Blayl, they saved Captain Beydlin’s life.
Hans Scherhag was born on 28 March 1920 in Arzheim, Koblenz. He grew up in a Catholic family; his father was a bricklayer. He was working as a painter before his conscription to the Wehrmacht in 1940. He was an MG-gunner with the 110th Grenadier Regiment / 112th Infantry Division, and he deserted to the Red Army in August 1941 near Gomel. He became involved in the work of the anti-fascist camp activists and in 1943 was delegated to training courses in anti-fascist schools, subsequently volunteered for front-line service with the newly founded NKFD deployed to the Northwest Front of the Red Army. In December 1943 he belonged with Rudi Bleil and other comrades to an agitation group that on 8 December they parachuted into the operational area of the 7th Leningrad Partisan Brigade and carried out reconnaissance work among German soldiers in the surrounding Wehrmacht garrisons to end the war; after the liberation of Leningrad, he returned to the Front Anti-Fascist School at the 2nd Baltic Front, where he operated on the encircled forces in and around the Courland Pocket, until the spring of 1945. In May 1945, he returned to Germany with the troops of the 1st Baltic Front.
After the war, he was a founding member of the Communist Party in East Germany and died on 14 April 1984.
A documentary about his life was made by the State Television of the DDR in 1974.
I do apologise for the poor quality of these photos. I took these photos years ago with a crappy camera… one day, hopefully, I should re-take the pictures of these awards and the badge as well…
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