https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/for-sale-world-war-ii-telegram
The telegram currently in an auction features a simple message in German: “2 Company crossed frontier about 0100 hours without incident. Herzner.”
The atlas obscure website mentions: “The pithy communique is dated August 26, 1939, a week before the typically cited onset of the war. It chronicles a little-known German commando force’s covert mission, assigned by Hitler himself, that was part of a large-scale effort to prepare for the invasion of Poland…”
“The ‘Jablonkow Incident’ was one of numerous German provocations in advance of, and in preparation for, the invasion of Poland, which had been scheduled for September 1,” says Neal Pease, a historian at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, via email. “The immediate purpose of the German raid at Jablonkow was to try to capture a strategic rail tunnel.”
I recently read about this bizarre incident in Richard Overy’s slim paperback volume of history, 1939: Countdown to War (2009). You can read more about this here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabłonków_incident
This bizarre story, the first commando raid of the war, might make an interesting early WW2 railway related Skirmish or raid scenario for future gaming.
Blog posted by Mark Man of TIN, 25 July 2019
Sidetracked 