GERMAN RAD EM/NCO ALUMINIUM BELT BUCKLE AND BELT

This is a RAD Reichsarbeitsdienst belt and buckle with the RAD emblem of a shovel with a swastika inside.

Belt size 95 cm.  The leather belt is marked with the maker:  Günther & Windrath GmbH & Co. KG.

Received from the Royal Winnipeg Rifles Museum, Canada.  The museum was selling off some of there museum’s items, to make room for more.  The museum called it deaccessioning surplus museum artifacts.

The museum numbers their items for inventory purposes and you will see that there is a very small white numbered sticker/or marking on this item put there by the museum.  They are very easy to remove.

The RAD or Reich Labour Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst) was a paramilitary organization that was meant to help with the effect of unemployment on Nazi Germany by militarizing the workforce and indoctrinating them to the Nazi ideology.  

It became the official state labour services for WW2.