40 Recipients of the Iron Cross (1939), 1st class

Wichard von Alvensleben was a German agriculturist, Wehrmacht Officer, and Knight of the Order of Saint John. He was a member of the aristocratic House of Alvensleben, one of the oldest in Germany.

Ion Antonescu was a Romanian military officer and marshal who presided over two successive wartime dictatorships as Prime Minister and Conducător during most of World War II.

Wolf Graf von Baudissin was a German general, military planner and peace researcher. He was one of the developers of the concepts of Innere Führung and Staatsbürger in Uniform, the two lead concepts of the modern German Bundeswehr.

Winrich Behr was a German officer during World War II. He was on the intelligence staff of the Sixth Army during the Stalingrad encirclement. Behr had served Friedrich Paulus, Erwin Rommel, Gunther von Kluge, Walter Model. He was the witness of Model's last hours in Ruhr Pocket.

Friedrich Buchardt was a Baltic German SS functionary who commanded Vorkommando Moskau, one of the divisions of Einsatzgruppe B. Post-war, he worked for MI6 and then, presumably, for the CIA. Buchardt was never prosecuted, being one of the agents of more sinister reputation used by the West after the war.

Eckhard Christian was a Luftwaffe officer in World War II, and rose to the rank of Generalmajor. On 2 February 1943, he married Gerda Daranowski who was one of Adolf Hitler's private secretaries during World War II. Christian was captured by British troops on 8 May 1945 and held in custody until 7 May 1947.

Ioan Dicezare was a leading Romanian fighter pilot and flying ace in World War II. He was born and died in Bucharest.

Luigi Gorrini, MOVM, was an Italian World War II fighter pilot in the Regia Aeronautica and in the Aeronautica Nazionale Repubblicana. During the conflict he flew with the Corpo Aereo Italiano during the Battle of Britain, fought over Libya and Tunisia, and was involved in the defence of the Italian mainland. Gorrini was credited with 19 enemy planes shot down plus 9 damaged, of several types: Bristol Beaufighter, Bristol Blenheim Curtiss P-40, Spitfire, P-38 Lightning, P-47 Thunderbolt, B-17 "Flying Fortress" and B-24 Liberator. He claimed his air victories flying the biplane Fiat C.R.42 and monoplanes Macchi C.202 and C.205 Veltro. Gorrini was the top scoring C.205 pilot. With the Veltro he shot down 14 enemy planes and damaged six more. He was the highest ranking Italian ace still alive until his death, and the only surviving fighter pilot awarded the Medaglia d'Oro al Valor Militare.

Otto Günsche was a mid-ranking officer in the Waffen-SS of Nazi Germany during World War II. He was a member of the SS Division Leibstandarte before he became Adolf Hitler's personal adjutant. Günsche was taken prisoner by soldiers of the Red Army in Berlin on 2 May 1945. After being held in various prisons and labour camps in the Soviet Union, he was released from Bautzen Penitentiary on 2 May 1956.

Werner Karl Otto Theodor von Haeften was an Oberleutnant in the Wehrmacht who took part in the military-based conspiracy against Adolf Hitler known as the 20 July plot.

Reino Henrik Hallamaa was a Finnish Colonel and developer and head of the Finnish Radio Intelligence during World War II.

Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich was a high-ranking German SS and police official during the Nazi era and a principal architect of the Holocaust. He was chief of the Reich Security Main Office. He was also Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor of Bohemia and Moravia. He served as president of the International Criminal Police Commission and chaired the January 1942 Wannsee Conference which formalised plans for the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question"—the deportation and genocide of all Jews in German-occupied Europe.

Sophus Magdalon Buck Kahrs was a Norwegian commander in the German SS during the Nazi era. Following the war, he was convicted for treason.

Bronislav Vladislavovich Stroganof Kaminski was a Russian anti-communist collaborationist and the commander of the Kaminski Brigade, an anti-partisan and rear-security formation made up of people from the so-called Lokot Autonomy territory in the Nazi Germany occupied areas of Russia, which was later incorporated into the Waffen-SS as the SS Sturmbrigade RONA ]. Older publications mistakenly give his first name as Mieczyslaw. Under Kamniski's command, the unit committed numerous war crimes and atrocities in the German-occupied Soviet Union and Poland.

Izidor Kovárik was a fighter pilot in the Czechoslovak Air Force (1938–39) and Slovak Air Force (1939–44) who became a flying ace on the Eastern Front in the Second World War. He became Slovakia's second-highest scoring fighter ace, shooting down 28 Soviet aircraft and probably one more. He was killed in an aircraft accident in 1944.

Karl Wilhelm Krause was a Waffen-SS officer who rose to the rank of SS-Hauptsturmführer (captain) during World War II. He was a personal orderly (valet) and bodyguard to Adolf Hitler from 1934 to mid-September 1939. Thereafter, he served in the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend. Krause came up with the concept of an anti-aircraft tank that became known as the Flakpanzer IV Wirbelwind. At the war's end he surrendered to American troops. Krause was interned until June 1946.

Vladimir Kren was a Croatian major general and commander of the Air Force of the Independent State of Croatia (ZNDH) during World War II. He was an officer in the Royal Yugoslav Air Force (VVKJ) before the war. In April 1941, he defected to Nazi Germany and handed over the locations of many of the VVKJ's dispersal airfields and exposed many of its codes. This made it easier for the Luftwaffe to destroy the VVKJ during the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia, which began shortly after Kren's defection.

Bernhard-Viktor Christoph-Carl von Bülow, known as Vicco von Bülow or Loriot, was a German comedian, humorist, cartoonist, film director, actor and writer.

Günter Luther was a German admiral who became Inspector of the Navy and Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe for NATO. During World War II, he served as a military pilot in the Kriegsmarine and a paratrooper in the Luftwaffe. After the war, he joined the newly founded West German Bundesmarine in 1956.

Helmut Machemer was a German ophthalmologist who served as "Truppenarzt" with the rank of "Unterarzt", corresponding to the rank of sergeant. He worked with Professor Aurel von Szily in Münster during the 1930s and, with him, pioneered an electrical treatment for retinal detachment. Machemer suffered discrimination in Nazi Germany after his wife was deemed to be "half-Jewish". He joined the German army at the outbreak of the Second World War in the hope of winning a first class Iron Cross bravery medal. Machemer hoped this would allow his family to be reclassified as being of "German-blood". He fought in France and Russia, was wounded in action and won both the Iron Cross 1st Class and Iron Cross 2nd Class. Machemer was killed in action at the Second Battle of Kharkov on 18 May 1942, just four days after being notified of the first class award. His wife and children were granted German-blood status in March 1943. Machemer kept extensive written, photographic and film records of his wartime service and these have been published in a book and documentary film.

Josef Mengele, also known as the Angel of Death, was a German Schutzstaffel (SS) officer and physician during World War II. He is mainly remembered for his actions at the Auschwitz concentration camp, where he performed deadly experiments on prisoners, and was a member of the team of doctors who selected victims to be killed in the gas chambers and was one of the doctors who administered the gas. With Red Army troops sweeping through German-occupied Poland, Mengele was transferred 280 kilometres (170 mi) from Auschwitz to the Gross-Rosen concentration camp on 17 January 1945, ten days before the arrival of the Soviet forces at Auschwitz.

Marko Mesić was a decorated gunnery officer who served in the armies of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Independent State of Croatia, and the SFR Yugoslavia. He is best known for being the final commander of Croatian legionnaires in World War II, serving in the German Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front and in the Battle of Stalingrad.

August Edler von Meyszner was an Austrian Gendarmerie officer, right-wing politician, and senior Ordnungspolizei officer who held the post of Higher SS and Police Leader in the German-occupied territory of Serbia from January 1942 to March 1944, during World War II. He has been described as one of Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler's most brutal subordinates.

Michael I was the last King of Romania, reigning from 20 July 1927 to 8 June 1930 and again from 6 September 1940 until his forced abdication on 30 December 1947.

Major Wilhelm Oxenius was a German Wehrmacht officer during World War II.

Rudolf Rahn was a German diplomat who served the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany. As a member of the Party, and as Plenipotentiary to the Italian Social Republic in the closing stages of the Second World War, he was arrested and held at Nuremberg as a potential war criminal, but he was released in 1949 and deemed to be denazified in Class V (exonerated).

Hanna Reitsch was a German aviator and test pilot. Along with Melitta von Stauffenberg, she flight tested many of Germany's new aircraft during World War II and received many honors. Reitsch was among the very last people to meet Adolf Hitler alive in the Führerbunker in late April 1945.

Ferdinand von Sammern-Frankenegg was a German SS functionary during the Nazi era. He served in World War I and then after Germany had formally surrendered, in the Freikorps Oberland and the Steirischer Heimatschutz. He served as SS and Police Leader of the Warsaw area in German-occupied Poland from 1941 until 1943 during World War II.

Christian Frederik von Schalburg was a Danish army officer, the second commander of Free Corps Denmark and brother of Vera Schalburg.

Walter Friedrich Schellenberg was a German SS functionary during the Nazi era. He rose through the ranks of the SS, becoming one of the highest ranking men in the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) and eventually assumed the position as head of foreign intelligence for Nazi Germany following the abolition of the Abwehr in 1944.

Wilhelm Schepmann was an SA general in Nazi Germany and the last Stabschef of the Nazi Stormtroopers.

Helmut Heinrich Waldemar Schmidt was a German politician and member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), who served as the chancellor of West Germany from 1974 to 1982.

Alexandru "Alecu" Șerbănescu was a leading Romanian fighter pilot and flying ace in World War II.

Hjalmar Fridolf Siilasvuo was a Finnish lieutenant general who led troops in the Winter War, Continuation War and Lapland War. He also saw action as a part of the Finnish volunteer "Jägerbattalion 27" fighting on the German side in World War I.

Jakob Sporrenberg was an SS-Gruppenführer und Generalleutnant der Polizei in Minsk, Belarus and Lublin, Poland. After the war, Sporrenberg stood trial in Poland and was convicted in 1950 of war crimes and sentenced to death. He was executed in December 1952.

Ilie Șteflea was a Romanian General during World War II and Chief of the Romanian General Staff between 20 January 1942 and 23 August 1944.

Bernhard Carl "Bert" Trautmann EK OBE BVO was a German professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper for Manchester City from 1949 to 1964.

Emil Uzelac was an Austro-Hungarian military commander who was a leading figure in the air forces of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the Independent State of Croatia.

Karl Rudolf Walden was a Finnish industrialist and a military leader.

Fritz Zängl was a German skier and soldier, at last in the rank of a Feldwebel.