BACKGROUND: The "Kurland", (Courland), cufftitle was the fourth and final cufftitle in a series of four campaign award cufftitles, (The Kreta, Afrika and Metz cufftitles were the first three), and was introduced on March 12TH 1945, for award to personnel who were encircled and successful held back the Russians in the Courland peninsula region of Latvia. The cufftitle was considered a military combat decoration, and as such, was bestowed with a corresponding award possession document. Bestowal of the award was opened to all personnel of Army Group Courland that were besieged in the Courland pocket. Criteria for award of the cufftitle include a minimum of three months service or three battle engagements in the pocket or only one engagement if wounded during the action. Of Note: Due to the inherent problems with supplying the encircled troops the majority of the cufftitles were manufactured within the pocket at a fabric weaving mill in the city of Kuldiga and some were also allegedly handmade by civilian women within the pocket. Also Of Note: Roughly thirty-two depleted Infantry divisions, two Panzer divisions and miscellaneous Latvian units consisting of approximately 200,000 personnel were trapped in late September 1944 when the Russians broke through the south east of Latvia and Lithuania to the Baltic sea. These personnel had formed Heeresgruppe Nord which was re-designated Heeresgruppe Kurland on January 25TH 1945 under the command of Generaloberst Dr. Lothar Rendulic. Between October 15TH 1944 and May 8TH 1945 the entrapped personnel repelled six major Soviet assaults with the Soviets enjoying a manpower superiority of between 6:1/10:1. According to German sources these assaults, commonly referred to as "Grand Battles", resulted in causing the Russians over 400,000 casualties, 2,600 lost tanks and around 700 aircraft with very little to show in territorial gains. The encircled Germans held out until the end of the war and "Fortress Courland" officially surrendered at 2:00pm on May 8TH 1945.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Machine woven silver/grey cotton construction cufftitle features machine woven black Latin script, "Kurland", to the center flanked on the left side by the shield of the Grand Master’s of the Order of the Teutonic Knight’s and on the right side by a stylized profile of an elks head which was the coat-of-arms of Mitau, (Jelgava), the principal city and historic capital of the Courland region. Both the top and bottom edges of the cufftitle are trimmed with dual horizontally machine woven black border stripes with evenly spaced dots between the stripes. The opened reverse of the cufftitle is an invert mirror image of the obverse and has the typical loose horizontal black threads. Scarce.