The Legionar issues were private "Vignetten" printed and put on sale by the Legions themselves. They had no postal value, if a stamp was required then the additional stamp had to applied. The "Vignetten" were simply added for propaganda reasons and to raise funds for the various Legions. I have never seen them in a British philatelic catalogue, but they can be found in German catalogues at the end of the occupations section.

Belgium - Flemish Legion 1941-1943

23rd December 1941. The first Flemish issue was printed in blocks of four and 30.000 sets were known printed.

In 1943 the remaining sets (3680 sets) were withdrawn and overprinted with an aircraft and the year "1943". There was four different aircraft which could be found on each stamp, so there was four different variations of each overprint.

Here you see a miniture sheet showing the four different aircraft in different positions on the same stamp. The stamps were printed both imperf and perf.

9th August 1943. The Kaiser set, printed in blocks of four, there were 30.000 sets, with an additional 7.000 sets imperf.

Prepared but never issued. Perf sets 6.000, Imperf sets 12.000. The last stamp contains the overprint "LANGEMARK". The reason why this set never reached the troops is unclear.

Belgium - Wallon Legion 1942

A propaganda "Vignetten", I was so pleased to find this one in some paperwork I purchased. I saw the same one on sale for 100€ a few years ago.

10th April 1942. Printed in blocks of four. Number of sets remains unknown but as they are not expensive as some of the other issues, it must have been a large number placed on sale.

France -LVF- 1941-1942

The French LVF Legion, or "Légion des Volontaires Francais" produced the following issues for the eastern front, which are also known used in France, be it in small numbers.

24th October 1941. The Polar Bear block, 30.000 printed.

10th December 1941. These two legion airmail stamps were withdrawn from sale five days later, to be overprinted and placed on sale again in January 1942. Without the overprint there were 141.000 sets sold.

15th January 1942. The overprinted versions went on sale. The overprint read "Eastern Front" in both the German and the French languages. 137.574 sets were sold, no one was allowed to purchase more than 5 to 10 sets each. Most ended up in the hands of philatelists in Paris. On 7th February 1942 the unsold stamps were withdrawn from sale and on the 8th February 1942 the rest were destroyed.

20th April 1942. The last French Legion set and perhaps the cheapest for philatelists to obtain, one million were printed.

Some of the stamps have this field with the LVF coat of arms, it is depending on where the stamp was on the sheet. There was another field version with the date "2-2-42" overprinted on it, but it is more rare.

Denmark  - Legion Dänemark - 1944

1944. The Danish Legion stamps were printed in blocks of four. Some contained an overprint "FELDPOST" but these were not authorised, the Danish spell it FELTPOST.

The two small holes just visible in the left hand margin indicates that these stamps were from one of the rare stamp booklets, the booklet covers were plain red in colour.

Latvia - Lettische Legion - 1944

1944. The Latvian philatelists were asked to help the Latvian War Relief association and design a set of Legion stamps to help raise funds for the war. Two Latvian artists, A.Apinis and R.Kaspatsons, were authorised to design the stamps. The authorisation took so long going back and forth, that Riga had already fallen to the Soviets before the 50.000 sets could be printed. One trial set and the paperwork is all that are left from this project and they are to be seen in the postal museum in Stockholm.

The Netherlands - Legioen Nederland - 1942

The Dutch Legion stamps were different from the above issues because they were official Dutch stamps with a full postal function issued by the Dutch post office.

1st November 1942. Designed by W.Nijs, the designs represent two Legionares, one at the sea ports and the other on farmland. The catalogues state that the red stamp is an officer and that the other stamp is a Legionare, when in fact looking at the collar insignia, both are Legionare rank.

The German MICHEL catalogue from 1961 illustrates well the blocks of 10 and 4 stamps.

One of the Legion stamps used on a postcard, to of all places, COLDITZ

Norway - Legion Norge - 1941-1943

The Norwegian Legion stamps had the same status as the Dutch stamps, they were official stamps issued from that countries post office. Both stamps were designed by H.Damsleth and were valid until 15th May 1945.

The first stamp was on sale 1st August 1941 and 100.000 were printed. The second stamp went on sale in August 1943.