Description

This is an extremely rare, ultra-large format Nazi sea chart of the critical northern reaches of the Yellow Sea, embracing the Bohai Sea (the maritime gateway to northern China, including Beijing and Tianjin), the Shandong Peninsula (with the major port of ‘Tsingtau’ / Qingdao), Manchuria’s Liaodong Peninsula (with ‘Dairen’ / Dalian and Port Arthur), as well as much of the west coast of Korea, extending south beyond Seoul/Inchon.

The chart was made for the Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine (Nazi German Navy High Command), and published in late August 1942, in Berlin, by the venerable old map house of Dietrich Reimer (Andrews & Steiner).

At the time, during the height of World War II, the area depicted was one of the most important and prized regions under the occupation of Japan. Japan had a longstanding presence in the area, having controlled Korea since 1895 and southern Manchuria since 1905 (while turning all Manchuria into the puppet state of ‘Manchukuo’ in 1932). These areas were under Japanese military control, while Japan oversaw the rapid industrialization of their economies (albeit under a brutally repressive regime).

During the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-45), which bled into World War II, Japan invaded China proper, taking the Beijing-Tianjin corridor at the Battle of Beiping–Tianjin (July 7 – August 8, 1937), while is seizing Qingdao in 1938. From them on, until 1945, the greater region was a major source of capital and manpower supporting the Japanese war effort, and the seas depicted provided routes for vital military and commercial shipping.

While Nazi Germany had only a very limited direct role in the affairs of the Northern China-Korea region during this time, it provided vital advice and technology to the Imperial Japanese Navy operating in that theatre (Japan formally entered World War II on the Axis side in December 1941). Moreover, Germany had a very deep historical and commercial interest in the region. Germany once possessed great trading links there, maintaining a concession in Tianjin (1895 to 1917). Most importantly, from 1898 to 1914, Germany held the ‘Kiautschou Bay Leased Territory’, on the Shandong Peninsula, whereupon they developed the city of ‘Tsingtau’ (Qingdao) into major commercial port. While Germany’s fixed presence in the region came to an end during World War I (when its troops were evicted by the Japanese), Japan’s takeover of Northern China opened the possibility of Germany someday renewing its commercial ambitions.

The Chart in Focus

This very sophisticated and up-to-date chart takes in all the ‘Golf von Pohai’ (Bohai Sea) and shows the mouth of the ‘Pei ho’ (Hai River), which leads up to Tianjin. To the north is the ‘Liau Tung Golf’ (Liaodong Bay) with the key Manchurian port of ‘Yingkow’ (Yingkou), while the ‘Liau Tung-Halbinsel’ (Liaodong Peninsula) lies to is southwest, featuring the major city of ‘Darien’ (Dalian) and Port Arthur, while the chart marks the ‘Grenze zwischen Mandschukuo und Japan’, being the boundary between the Japanese sovereign territories on the peninsula and the Manchukuo puppet state.

To the southwest, on the other side the ‘Strasze von Pohai’ (Bohai Strait), is the ‘Schantung’ (Shandong) Peninsula, home the to ‘Tsingtsau’ (Qingdao), the former German treaty port, as well as the late British cessionary territory of the ‘Weihaiwei’ (controlled by Britain from 1898 to 1930), with the chart showing its former boundaries marked as the ‘Britisch-Chinesische Grenze’. To the east, across the northern part of the ‘Gelbes Meer’ (Yellow Sea), is the west coast of Korea, labelling ‘Ping Yang’ (Pyongyang), Seoul, Inchon and extending as far south as ‘Kunsan’ (Gunsan).

The seas feature exhaustive nautical information, including copious bathymetric soundings and the locations of dated shipwrecks (some being quite recent). All major rivers and estuaries are depicted, while heights of land are expressed by hachures, with many featuring spot heights. Depicted are the locations of lighthouses (highlighted in yellow) and beacons (highlighted in pink), while all major cities and towns are marked, along with the routes of the railways.

The inset map on the lefthand side shows the chart’s relationship to charts of the region published by the British Admiralty, which were long the most popular maritime maps of the Yellow Sea.

The template for the present map was first issued by the Imperial German Navy during World War I, in February 1916, as noted by the line in the bottom margin that reads: ‘Herausgegeben vom Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine, Berlin, 1916. II’. As noted by the line, ‘Neue Ausgabe, 1926, X.’, the chart was heavily revised and reissued in October 1926.

Third Reich naval cartographers then created their own editions of the map, conspicuously modifying the chart, by placing the insignia of the Nazi Eagle above the title. As noted in the bottom margin of the present chart, ‘Kleine Berichtingungen’ (Small Corrections) were made to the chart on September 4, 1941, December 4, 1941, and August 27, 1942 (these last corrections being incorporated into the present example of the chart).

We are not sure as to how many Nazi-era editions of the chart were printed. However, we have been able to trace references to issues dated 1937, 1938, 1940, 1941 and 1942.

The present example of t he chart, like most Nazi sea charts, features numerous contemporary handstamps and pastedown labels, indicative of the Third Reich’s obsession with classification and order. Notably, it features the handstamp (to the upper right of the title and on the verso) of the ‘Kriegsmarinewerft Wilhelmshaven Kartengruppe’, featuring the Nazi Eagle insignia. This means that the chart was once issued for use at the Wilhelmshaven Naval Shipyard, Germany’s largest U-boat base.

The pink handstamped box, upper right, bearing the note ‘Siehe Nachr.[icht] für Seef’ [See Message for Safe] is a detail intended for any storage/security notes that may have applied to the chart.
Below the title, a red printed pastedown label reads: ‘Für Strom und Gezeiten sind nicht die Eintragungen in den Karten maßgebend, sondern die Angaben der Stromkarte, Gezeitentafeln und Seehandbücher.’ [For currents and tides, it is not the entries on the map that are decisive, but rather the information on tide tables and nautical manuals].

A purple stamp, in the lower left margin, reads: ‘Die Karte wird vom letzten kleinen Berichtingungsdatum ab bis auf weiteres nicht auf mehr Berichtigt’ [The Chart will not be corrected from the last minor reporting date until further notice].

A Note on Rarity

All sea charts issued by the Nazi-era Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine are today extremely rare. They were issued in only small print runs for restricted official use, while the survival rate of large format sea charts is generally very low, due to the wear and tear of use aboard ship, while it must be considered that many Nazi charts would have been intentionally destroyed in the wake of the war, as Third Reich documents dramatically fell out of favour.

All Nazi issues of the present chart are today extremely rare. We can trace only a single other institutional example of the present 1942 edition, held by the Bundesamt für Seeschifffahrt und Hydrographie (BHS)-Bibliothek (the library of the Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency of Germany, which has divisions Hamburg and Rostock), while the BHS also holds examples of the 1938, 1940, 1941 issues. Beyond that, the only other example of which we are aware is of a 1938 edition held in a private Dutch collection. Moreover, we cannot trace any sale records for any other examples of the chart in any of its issues.

References: Bundesamt für Seeschifffahrt und Hydrographie-Bibliothek (Rostock): R 553(1942)BSH.