Flammenwerfer! Flames, skulls and stuff

[Robin Lumsden]

Hey, Robin:

Dark Totenkopfen!

http://cgi.ebay.de/Real-Photo-No-52-Stahlhelm-Pistole-Totenkopf-Trauerzug_W0QQitemZ220473565079QQcmdZViewItemQQptZMilitaria?hash=item33553f9f97&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

Looks like Reichswehr uniforms in the background.

Interesting! Thanks Thomas.

:beer:

[Robin Lumsden]

Not an sleeve insignia, but has anyone seen this skull before? It is in form similar to a stickpin. The cap is marked inside, "St.B.XIV" for a unit marking and also has a Bekleidungs-Amt stamp of "B.A.XIII 1916". The cap was only lightly worn, so I am guessing the insignia is a postwar addition. The cap was brought back to the U.S. with this skull already on it.

Chip

If the skull is blackened, it could be from the Schwarze Jaeger Freikorps...............

[Sergeant 08]

The guy with the flying helmet is a classic.

Really?! Never seen before. Do you have more informations about this guy?

Edited August 31, 2009 by Sergeant 08

[Sergeant 08]

Flammenwerfer! This postcard I have seen today.

Edited August 31, 2009 by Sergeant 08

[Thomas W]

Sergeant 08, those are the Wechselapparat (Wex) M.1917. That is a reinforced Wex squad (verstärkter Wextrupp) consisting of two Wex squads. Each Wex squad is made up of one lance operator (Strahlrohrführer), Wex carrier (Wexträger), and assistant (Hilfsmann). A squad leader (Truppführer)--the man on the right with the hand grenade--is in command. He would be either a private first class (Gefreiter) or a corporal (Unteroffizier).

You can tell that this is a posed photo because the flamethrower lances do not have igniters in the holders on the nozzles. In actual combat igniters would be put into the holders, like this:

Edited August 31, 2009 by Thomas W

[Sergeant 08]

You can tell that this is a posed photo because the flamethrower lances do not have igniters in the holders on the nozzles. In actual combat igniters would be put into the holders, like this:

Because it was no private photo and only a postcard, I thought it was a posed photo. Thanks for the informations, Thomas! I'm more and more interested in flamethrower troops.

[Robin Lumsden]

Really?! Never seen before. Do you have more informations about this guy?

By 'classic', I mean it's a 'great' photo..............I've never seen it before either.

[Sergeant 08]

By 'classic', I mean it's a 'great' photo..............I've never seen it before either.

Aha! I thought, that I missed the photo in past...

[Sergeant 08]

Here is one of my favourite photos. 1918!

[Sergeant 08]

.

Edited September 1, 2009 by Sergeant 08

[Sergeant 08]

..

[Robin Lumsden]

Nice!

Interesting to see how they all turn their sleeves to 'show off' the TK patches.

A bit like these newly promoted corporals who put themselves into contortions to show off their stripes!

[Thomas W]

The last photo Sergeant 08 posted shows men from Sturmbataillon Nr. 14. It's one of five photos I have in my collection, all of which were once owned by a Polish flamethrower pioneer who served in the German army.

Here's one of my photos, which has handwriting on the back that identifies the men as the flamethrower platoon of Sturmbataillon Nr. 14. Some of the men--such as the guy standing on the far right and the one lying in front on his right side--are former members of Sturmbataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr), as shown by the placement of the Totenkopf badge near the elbow instead of on or above the cuff.

Three of my Polish photos will be in my upcoming book Flamethrower Troops of World War I: The Central and Allied Powers.

Edited September 2, 2009 by Thomas W

[Thomas W]

Here's the same man who is kneeling on the right in Sergeant 08's photo. He was a former member of Sturmbataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr), as shown by another photo I have of him, which shows the Totenkopf badge at the elbow.

Edited September 2, 2009 by Thomas W

[Thomas W]

On the left, here's a member of the Garde-Pionier-Ersatz-Bataillon, a war volunteer (Kriegsfreiwilliger) photographed in October of 1914. This photo came from the family album of a firefighter.

Edited September 2, 2009 by Thomas W

[Thomas W]

Here's the same former man of the Garde-Pionier-Ersatz-Bataillon, now a member of the Garde-Reserve-Pionier-Regiment, photographed April 24, 1918, while serving in the flamethrower platoon of Sturmbataillon Nr. 15. It makes you wonder if he survived the war...

[Thomas W]

Even though the thread is about Totenkopfen, it's got a lot of flamethrower stuff, so here's a very rare photo for you, Sergeant 08. It's a Russian flame-chemical sapper of the First Army Chemical Detachment, taken in late 1917 or early 1918 after the revolution. The Chemical Detachments were composed of about 125 men each. They operated flamethrowers, used poison gas, and created smoke screens. I have a different photo of the same man that will appear in my upcoming book, so I thought I'd post this one here.

[Sergeant 08]

Thomas, you purchased the photo that I posted in #190? Congratulations! As I said, one of my favourite photos that I have seen during last years.

Thanks for the other photos and informations too! I can't await to buy your new book .

[bob lembke]

Sergeant 08;

Perhaps we can cooperate and figure out more about the excellent photo posted in post # 180. I have organized information on the great majority of flame attacks in the war, but I do not have anything on an attack on September 9, 1918. (I might add that the records and other sources get less reliable in the last months of the war.) Ronvaux is in the Region of Lorraine, Department of the Meuse, seemingly about 25 km ESE of the town of Verdun.

However, my material indicates that a GRPR flame pioneer of the 9th Company died in Kriegs=Lazarett 32 Origny on the same day. There are several Origny's in France, for example one in Normandy, one north of Reims very close to the Belgian border, but the one that seems closest to the front at that time was Onigny-Sante-Benoite. However, that one was quite a distance from Ronvaux, so the death in the Kriegs=Lazarett was almost certainly not connected to the attack commemorated in the photo.

Tom identified the fellow in the photo kneeling to our right as also being on another picture of his, and identified the men in that group as being in the flamethrower platoon of Sturm=Bataillon Nr. 14 at that time. (Tom, do you mean a flamethrower platoon integral to S=B Nr. 14, like the flamethrower platoon permamently retained by Sturm=Bataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr), or do you mean a flame platoon of Garde=Reserve=Pionier=Regiment on loan to that storm battalion at that time?) This can suggest that the men in the photo in post # 190 are from S=B Nr. 14, or that twice identified man was in a different flame formation at the time of the first picture, September 9, 1918, or just after. If we have a date or approximate date for the second photo we will have a leg up.

I can try to find out what was happening at Ronvaux at that time from other sources, but again the material is weaker and thinner that late in the war.

Bob Lembke

[bob lembke]

Just poked thru a file of the OHL (Highest Army Command) Daily Communiques for this period of time, but there was no mention of an engagement in this area.

Bob

[Robin Lumsden]

Hello Bob.

I'd value your opinion on the black skull badge I posted at the start of this thread.

I'm pretty sure it's contemporary (i.e. from the 1916-1920s timeframe) but I haven't a clue what it is.

Edited September 3, 2009 by Robin Lumsden

[bob lembke]

Hello Bob.

I'd value your opinion on the black skull badge I posted at the start of this thread.

I'm pretty sure it's contemporary (i.e. from the 1916-1920s timeframe) but I haven't a clue what it is.

Robin;

I thank you for asking, but I do not really study the insignea stuff, medals, etc. much, and don't have a lot of photos or bits and pieces. I toil in other vineyards, like the actual history of engagements, men, etc. I like the little stuff, and treasure my father's, but I am not over the top about it.

There has been a lot of interest in the authenticity of Totenkopf. I have a lot of my father's stuff, but he had one of his badges, but at some time, my mother, a dear soul but mentally ill a lot of the time (bi-polar syndrome, to be politically correct) took his Totenkopf and threw it away, as it frightened her. But I still have a chunk of his left arm bone chipped off by a French shell splinter at Verdun, which I would not trade for the Totenkopf on a bet. I have a great story about Pop and his Totenkopf when he briefly fell into the hands of the French in the French lines during a flame attack at Verdun, but I am going to wait until I publish it, before posting it in nothing-space.

With his piece we would have a good gold standard for comparison. But I agree that there seems to have been a great deal of variation. I don't have many of his pictures from the flame unit, but they show a lot of variation in markings worn, etc. 95 years later we seem to think that these guys spent all of their time preparing for parades and inspections. I have interacted a bit with re-enactors (Sturm=Bataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr) ), and they are totally over the top with authenticity over and beyond that of the real guys.

Bob

[Robin Lumsden]

Many thanks for your reply, Bob.

It's much appreciated. :cheers:

[Thomas W]

Robin, I have a possible explanation for the black Totenkopf shaped like the official flamethrower Totenkopf, even though it's pure speculation:

The replacement battalion for the flamethrower regiment was the II. Garde-Pionier-Ersatz-Bataillon, based in Berlin. It provided fully trained flamethrower pioneers for the flamethrower regiment and the flamethrower platoon of Sturmbataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr). Photos of this unit are very rare. I have three, and none of them show the men wearing the flamethrower badge, since the badge was awarded only to the regiment. On closer examination, however...

I want back through my old scans and found a group photo with an officer who MAY have an unofficial Totenkopf on his sleeve. As I pointed out earlier in this thread officers often wore the Totenkopf sewn directly to the sleeve, with no oval cloth backing. In this photo there's a dark skull-shaped thing with what looks like two eye holes, and it's on the left sleeve in the correct place for officers.

I used a photo in my first book provided to me by a French collector, which shows men at flamethrower school before they became official members of the II. Garde-Pionier-Ersatz-Bataillon. One of them wears a metal Prussian cap badge on his left sleeve, an unofficial way of denoting his status as a trainee flamethrower pioneer. I can't post the photo here, because it's not mine.

If impatient men of the flamethrower replacement battalion wanted to boast of their impending elite status, they might devise an unofficial badge to wear during the many months they were replacements. I have a flamethrower pioneer's Militärpasse, which shows that he spent almost a year in the replacement battalion. Maybe such long periods cooling your heels in Berlin were not uncommon.

As I said, it's just speculation. But my officer here may be wearing a dark Totenkopf.

Edited September 3, 2009 by Thomas W

[Thomas W]

I did a little enhancing, and that sure looks like a skull with eye holes to me. There also appear to be crossbones below the skull.