Erich Johann Albert Raeder was a German admiral who played a major role in the naval history of World War II, and was convicted of war crimes after the war. Raeder attained the highest possible naval rank, that of grand admiral, in 1939, becoming the first person to hold that rank since Henning von Holtzendorff in 1918. Raeder led the Kriegsmarine for the first half of the war; he resigned in January 1943 and was replaced by Karl Dönitz. At the Nuremberg trials he was sentenced to life imprisonment but was released early owing to failing health in 1955.
Erich Raeder (second from left) and the staff of Vice Admiral Franz von Hipper (center), 1916
Raeder and Paul von Hindenburg in Kiel, 1931
Rolf Hans Wilhelm Karl Carls was a high-ranking German admiral during World War II. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross of Nazi Germany.
Kapitänleutnant Carls (right) at a naval artillery observation post in the Dardanelles, 1915
Carls with Polish general Tadeusz Kutrzeba oboard the heavy cruiser Deutschland, Kiel, 1935
Carls and Rear Admiral Theodor Burchardi visiting a port on the Eastern Front, May 1942