Thomas W

I didn't know that Jäger- (Sturm-) Bataillon Nr. 3 had an arm badge. Would you happen to have a clear image of it?

Can anybody identify this unit and the arm badge? Thanks.

I think you're right...

Glass eye or strabismus, either from a wound or from birth. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strabismus Could a man with strabismus join the flamethrower regiment if he already had the condition? Or was he wounded and allowed to remain?

From the same card that I just received, I present the most haunting portrait in my collection:

Sergeant 08: I received the card I posted above. Not a black Totenkopf. Dark, but not black.

Thanks very much. I'm trying to find where Yanny is, using Google, and I keep getting information on Yanni the horrible new-age musician!

I don't know. The Serbian Black Hand (which also used a Totenkopf symbol) started the war by killing Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Maybe this is a sarcastic German joke photo commenting about the war? I can't read the name of the park on the back of the card, but it looks Slavic.

Yup. They are indeed Germans. Sorry I didn't clarify. The two seated men and the bearded man may be Guard Pioneers, which is why I bought the card. Anything to do with German Guard Pioneers and Totenkopf makes me excited.

The back of the Black Hand card:

Just bought this. The rear says "Meeting of the Black Hand at the park at_________. 1.6.16" The Black Hand in Serbia was a nationalist organization that fielded assassins who killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The Serbian Black Hand also used a skull-and-crossbones motif. I wonder what the story of this postcard is...?

Will do...

If it arrives safely from Germany, I'll be glad to. I've lost so many cards now that I think I have only about a 65 percent chance of receiving it.

I did. I had to have it. I'm sorry if you bid on it, but it was unique. It shows the 1.4m kleine Strahlrohr M.1914 very clearly. I've let other flamethrower postcards go, but I had to have this one. Please don't make me feel bad for buying it!!!!!!!!

Just sold on eBay... Look at the man standing on the far right, Robin. That looks suspiciously like a very dark Totenkopf sleeve badge.

He's wearing the simplified Bavarian M.1907 tunic, which was issued in 1915. It was worn only by Bavarians. The giveaway is the cuff. The lower cockade on his cap is Bavarian, too. It may be a pioneer thing. Here's a man wearing a simplified Bavarian M.1907 tunic (note the cuff and the rampant lion on the buttons) with black pioneer shoulder straps, a Prussian belt, and a cap with the Prussian cockade. Is he a Prussian or a Bavarian? He's got an Edelweiss on his cap, so...

Great! Thanks very much. I appreciate it.

Can anybody tell me what the "6.3" on this shoulder strap means? Thanks very much.

Oops! Thanks for the correction, Chip.

Thanks, Robin. I appreciate it.

He/she looks very businesslike, like the men. And note that the two guys seated in front are pointing their rifles at each others' heads. Something tells me the unit spent too much time on training with flamethrowers and not enough on basic firearm safety...

Here's my drawing of the skull cap badge worn by flamethrower sappers of k.u.k. Sappeur-Bataillon Nr. 61. It was about one inch square and made of white metal, with a red enameled oval beneath the numbers. The Austrian military had no tradition of using skulls in its motifs. It was influenced by the flamethrower platoon of German Sturmbataillon Rohr, who wore the death's head sleeve badge.

The flamethrower sappers of k.u.k. Sappeur-Battalion Nr. 61, also called Spezialsappeurbataillon, Sappeur-Spezial-Battalion Nr. 61, and Spezial-Sturmbataillon Nr. 61, wore a metal skull badge on their caps. Here are sappers from the 2nd Company, k.u.k. Sappeur-Bataillon Nr. 61, based in Krems.

No period photo of a black skull, because the image is still at the publisher's. But here's a Bavarian flamethrower pioneer wearing the Bavarian M.1916 tunic and a cap with the Bavarian cockade. This is the only photo I've ever seen of a Bavarian flamethrower pioneer...

That's a French Schilt No. 2 flamethrower. The poor men who used it had to carry it into battle using that wooden frame. The lance had no trigger or valve, so the way it was used was that the men carrying it had put it down on the ground. One man would throw incendiary grenades at the target, and then the second man would open the valve on the oil tank so that the lance operator could spray the oil at the flaming grenades. A second ignition method was to put small fuses on the end of the lance, but these only lasted for five seconds. This was a terrible weapon. In 1916 the French wisely changed the designation from "portable" to static, thus sparing the lives of the men who were assigned to use it.