[PW] Re: NSF

[John]

Many thanks to both Tsviya Polani and Graeme Rymill, who dug into this 
question for me but who questioned the answer provided by Kevin.

I have received a further clarification from someone in Germany (via 
Google Answers) on the NSF question. Here it is:

"I have do doubt that "NSF", in the context described by you, stands for 
"Nationalsozialistische Frauenschaft" (short: NS-Frauenschaft, acronym: 
NSF), which means "National Socialist Women's Organisation". The NSF was 
the official umbrella organisation for Nazi women's organisations, 
together with the Deutsches Frauenwerk (German Women's Movement, DFW) 
where former non-Nazi organisations had been pooled. 
Reichsfrauenführerin (Reich Women's Leader) Gertrud Scholtz-Klink 
(1902-1999) presided over both NSF and DFW, so they were effectively one 
single organisation comprising all German women's organisations. In 
addition, Gertrud Scholtz-Klink was also Leiterin des Reichsfrauenbunds 
des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes (Leader of the Reich Women's League of the 
German Red Cross) and of the Frauenamt der Deutschen Arbeitsfront 
(Women's Bureau of the German Labour Organisation, a universal Nazi 
substitute organisation for the abolished trade unions), making the NSF 
effectively a widely ramified organisation with access to a wide range 
of resources, such as canteen and field kitchens, clothing, health care 
facilities and much more, not to mention a huge pool of personnel and 
organisational structures that spanned the entire country. One of the 
main fields of activity of the NSF was charitable work. During the war, 
this was expanded to providing support to those who had lost their homes 
as a result of boming raids. Since the NSF's leader was also presiding 
over other women's organisations, those too were incorporated into the 
work. When in late 1944 refugees from the eastern parts of Germany 
started arriving, very often without any property and under chaotic 
circumstances, the NSF was among the organisations providing support to 
these persons and organising lodging and catering for them. It should 
not be concealed that, apart from all charitable aspects, the NSF was an 
organisation completely devoted to the views and aims of the Nazi 
ideologists. "

The really great part of all this is how we come to learn things that we 
otherwise would never have known.

Many thanks once more to Kevin, Tsviya, and Graeme.

John C. Sanders
Yorktown Heights, N.Y.