Germany, Third Reich. A Signed Ah Portrait, With Dedication To Willy Messerschmitt

(AH Bild mit Unterschrift). A reproduction studio portrait of AH, printed on matte photo paper and depicting the subject in a NSDAP uniform and with the 1914 Iron Cross I Class clearly visible, the lower left of the obverse bearing the studio mark of Heinrich Hoffmann, the Munich-based official photographer of the NSDAP, overlaid by a handwritten dedication from AH reading “DEM GENOSSEN WILLY MESSERSCHMITT, IN HERZLICHEN ANERKENNUNG ZU SEINEM GEBURTSTAG, 26. 6. 1940” (“TO COMRADE WILLY MESSERSCHMITT IN HEARTFELT RECOGNITION OF HIS BIRTHDAY, 26. 6. 1940”), pasted to a card stock backer, the portrait measuring 220 mm (w) x 288 mm (h), accompanied by a period frame, constructed of silver-plated non-ferrous metal with a black bakelite backer and stand, unmarked, measuring 242 mm (w) x 320 mm (h), with minor age-appropriate fading and soiling evident to the portrait, in overall near extremely fine condition.

Footnote: Wilhelm Emil “Willy” Messerschmitt was born on 26 June 1898 in Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany. Following military service late in the First World War, Messerschmitt and friend and collaborator Friedrich Harth entered the field of aviation, with the former attending Munich Technical College and the latter building aircraft at Bayerische Flugzeugwerke. Graduating in 1923 from the Munich Institute of Technology, Messerschmitt fell out with Harth and founded his own aviation company in Augsburg. Initially building small-powered sports and tourist planes, he made the acquaintance of powerful NSDAP officials including Rudolf Hess and Hermann Göring. With the founding of the Reich Aviation Ministry in 1933, Messerschmitt was awarded contracts to design and supply aircraft to the still-clandestine Luftwaffe, and in 1936 Messerschmitt’s Bf 109 was awarded the distinction of becoming the its primary fighter aircraft, almost immediately seeing service with the Condor Legion and Nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War. During the war years, Messerschmitt’s firm continued as the mainstay of German fighter production, and designed and produced the legendary Me-262, the world’s first operational jet fighter. However, these innovations arrived too late to change the course of the war, and upon Germany’s surrender, Messerschmitt was arrested and charged with crimes against humanity for the use of slave labour in his factories. Convicted in 1948, he served two years in prison and resumed his role as head of the company, manufacturing prefabricated buildings, sewing machines, and automobiles, as post-war Germany remained forbidden from possessing a domestic aircraft industry. With these restrictions lifted in the Federal Republic during the 1950s, Messerschmitt’s firm eventually resumed aircraft production and manufactured, among other aircraft, the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter. He retired in 1970 and died in Munich on 15 September 1978.