Dal McGuirk’s observations about the use of green Waffenfarben by Heer troops

[Mike Davis]

Dal McGuirk’s observations about the use of green (and other) Waffenfarben by Heer troops in North Africa

Dal McGuirk, distinguished author on the subject of uniforms, headgear and insignia worn by German forces in North Africa, Rommel’s Army in Africa (1987) and Afrikakorps Self Portrait (1992) has offered to share some of his experience and insight regarding this topic. I have pasted his commentary verbatim below. Many thanks to Dal for taking the time to participate and to supply illustrative examples.

[Mike Davis]

Green Waffenfarben (Arm of Service Colours) used by Rifle (or Motorised Infantry) Regiments in the German Army 1939-1941 (and other colours).

Many collectors feel there are still unanswered questions surrounding the fine detail of the transition of green arm of service colors in the Heer over 1939 - 1941 but in my opinion the essential facts are not in question. The pre-war motorized infantry regiments in the Panzer Divisions, known as "Rifle Regiments" (Schützen-regimenter), initially wore white piping, being infantry. However by 1938/39 the Army had recognized the specialized nature of their role and they were being assigned the light (sic) green also in use by Gebirgsjäger and Jäger, as infantry fulfilling a specialized infantry combat role. Brian Leigh Davis has written that in 1939 this colour had already been adopted (see his "Flags and Standards of the Third Reich") by at least one Schützenregiment.

Through my research I eventually learnt that this light green (hellgrün) while still in the process of being introduced was itself about to be replaced by the much lighter lime green (resedagrün) at the time in 1940 when the first tropical uniforms were being manufactured for the DAK. The evidence for a change over at this time is to be found in the mix of greens on the tropical uniforms issued in 1941, whether made in 1940 or in 1941. I understand from German sources that the decision to replace the hellgrün with resedagrün came about because of the rapid expansion of the Panzerwaffe in 1939/1940 and the consequent need to recognise the Schützenregimenter as an arm of service in their own right.

During the mid-1980s while I was still working on finishing “RAinA” it was unclear in my own mind just who in the DAK wore which green colour piping on their caps and shoulder straps. I did not understand the reason for the existence of two distinct shades of green on caps and shoulder straps. I was looking for some organisational niceties around this confusing situation. The few reference books I had access to ion the mid-1980s did not offer any explanation for this puzzle that tallied with the evidence I had of two shades of green Waffenfarbe. I could extend that figure to three shades if I were to include grass green or wiessengrün, a different colour I had found on a couple of caps and shoulder straps that seemed to fall between the other two shades of green piping. How could I explain the presence of two (or even three) shades of green piping? (I have assumed that the grass green shade may have been issued to members of Motorcycle Battalion 15 but I have not been able to tie any examples I found to a battlefield connection with that unit.)

I knew from what Karl-Heinz Böttger had told me how it came to be that the two MG Battalions wore light green or hellgrün (see below) but not how or why the Rifle Regiments were wearing two shades of green at the one time.

I received much help from two close friends in trying to resolve these questions, one a longtime DAK collector and the other Karl-Heinz Böttger who had been a Vice-President of the DAK Verband and who acted as my main point of reference in accessing information in Germany. I asked Karl-Heinz to quiz comrades he met at the annual DAK reunions who had served in the two Rifle Regiments that had gone with him to Africa in 1941 in 15th Panzer Division on what colour they had worn on their shoulder boards, and on their field caps. Karl-Heinz confirmed the use already of light green by officers in both Rifle Regiments over the period late 1939-1940. A few former officers who went to Libya in 1941 had kept their shoulder boards from Africa, and included a small number with lime green piping. What was important to me though was to learn when these officers went to Africa in 1941 they already wore a green piping (!) on their shoulder boards, i.e. on their woolen Continental uniforms. It was not a changeover that had taken place in Africa. Unfortunately Karl-Heinz was not always able to establish which specific shade of green was being referred to, and when. In the end it was not a significant distinction.

The simple truth is that both shades of green were being worn by those officers in 1941. Officers were not issued a tropical version of their shoulder boards. They either transferred shoulder boards from Continental uniforms to their new tropical tunic or used new shoulder boards they had just purchased from a military tailor in Germany before setting sail for Libya. A few of the military tailor shops in Germany must have had foreknowledge of the introduction of the new lime green arm of service color and stocked up with it, anticipating its general use, even well before its official introduction, for some officers in the two Schützen-regimenter in 15th Panzer Division to have purchased shoulder boards with the new color before leaving for Africa.

Thus I learnt that the light green Waffenfarbe I had seen on caps and shoulder straps had been in general use well before North Africa. What had not been clear to me before now became clear. The German army Army in 1941 was in the throes of replacing one shade of green for Schützenregimenter with another, and both were correct at that time, both were in usage, both were being worn ion the field, the old and the new. It was as simple as that. There was no cut off point in time for the use of the older colour in the field. It was possible for a new color to be worn even before it may have been officially gazetted for use. There was indeed no practical means of immediately replacing one color with another, and no need to do so.

For a wider application of this situation it meant that say in the case of a woolen Continental officer’s side cap with hellgrün soutache worn in 1939 or 1940 it could have belonged to an officer serving in a Rifle Regiment in one of the Panzer Divisions just as much as it could have belonged to an officer serving in a Jäger Battalion. There seems to be an unwillingness among the collecting community today to acknowledge the use of light green let alone lime green by the Schützenregimenter by 1940.

In 1940 the cap factories supplying the Army with the tropical uniforms for what was expected to be a Panzer Division serving in Africa were themselves in the process of changing from the existing light green for Rifle Regiments to the new color, the lime green or reseda-grün that was in the pipeline for general issue in 1941 and later. The cap factories (and factories making shoulder straps from off cuts from tunics and greatcoats) in 1940 were using a combination of the two colors, older and newer, hellgrün and resedagrün. The firm of Carl Halfar made tropical M40 caps in 1940 piped with both hellgrün (light green) and reseda-grün. (lime green). The firm of Robert Lubstein made the majority of its caps in 1940 with hellgrün and a smaller number with both the new the resedagrün and even the little used green colour wiessen-grün (assigned to Motorcycle Battalions). However by 1941 the cap makers were using more and more the reseda-grün soutache while still using up stocks of the earlier light-green braid.

There you have the evidence of transition from one color to another, a sure parallel timeline from 1940 to 1941, in the tropical caps souvenired in North Africa in 1941 and 1942 by 8th Army soldiers (and long before the nomenclature was officially changed in 1942 from Schützen-Regimenter to Panzergrenadier-Regimenter for the Motorized Infantry Regiments in Panzer and Light Divisions).

I believe this overlapping use of both shades of green continued right up to the time when soutaches were no longer being attached to field caps. The mixture of green soutaches we see in the so-called Beehive Cache of largely side caps is evidence that this was so. Cap factories continued to use the various shades of green, depending on what stocks were available, even including some of the little seen meadow-green (wiessengrün) braid.

In black and white photos from the period it is easy to distinguish the differences between hellgrün and resedagrün. The former comes out as a distinctly dark shade while the latter is quite a pale grey colour. The hellgrün soutache did not fade to any degree with washing and exposure to the African sun. The colour was remarkably fast. This is true of all the dyes used to make the Russia Braid in the soutache for all branches of service. Even the most washed and out and faded of caps still showed the true colour of their soutache.

We collectors of German uniforms depend in large measure on material captured by the Allied armies on the battlefield to provide us with the physical area of reference with which to fit our understanding of what we hold in our hands. The conditions for picking up a substantial quantity of enemy material of all kinds usually only existed in the wake of an enemy retreat. That is why we see so little of German uniform items worn in the 1940 invasion of the Low countries and France in collections. The Allied armies were in headlong retreat. They were not able to pick over the battlefield debris left behind by a retreating German Army or to souvenir items worn or carried by POWS.

It was the same for the Greek campaign. The Allied units were put to flight by the weight of the advancing Wehrmacht. Very little if any significant numbers of German uniform items were souvenired by the retreating Allied troops in Greece in April-May 1941.

It was only in North Africa in 1941 that the German Army was first stopped in its tracks and Allied soldiers were able to walk across a captured area of battle and pick over the material left behind by a retreating enemy. The Australian defense and counter attacks inside Tobruk in April-May 1941 produced the first worthwhile haul of souvenir material, some of which would eventually end up in postwar militaria collections. This window of opportunity in Tobruk gave the British Army its first good look at captured German weapons, tropical uniform and equipment.

I repeat myself- so much of what we collectors have in our collections today was obtained from battlefields occupied by Allied armies, starting mainly from 1942 and extending through to the end of the war. Uniform items souvenired later in the war represented a mixture of early and later manufactured material. However any uniform pieces originating from the very first engagements with the Wehrmacht in North Africa can only be related to the very early period of the war, or the pre-war period. The battlefield capture of uniform in 1941 is to my mind exceptional and marks an important area of study in its own right. It is by studying this early souvenir material, as much of it that survives today, that we are able to get a clear glimpse of the Wehrmacht as it had been in 1939, 1940 and 1941, before the quite massive changes and developments in uniform design and manufacture that started in 1942.


Arm of Service colour worn By MG Battalions in Africa 1941

When Hitler first authorised steps be put into place in August 1940 to start preparing 3rd Pz Div. for service in Africa, the tropical uniform that that was manufactured was to equip a Panzer Division, including creation of significant reserve stocks. As it turned out it was a Light Division that was shipped to Libya in early 1941. The 5th Light Division had two MG Battalions. However in its standard establishment a Pz Division had no MG Battalions. The MG arms were distributed at company level throughout the Rifle Regiments. Every company had a set number of MGs issued to them.

When the 5th Light Division was shipped to Libya only the two Army Anti-aircraft Battalions wore white. The Fla-Bataillon 606 and Fla-Bataillon 605 shared the available white-piped caps and shoulder straps. (Photo evidence would seem to indicate initially there were not enough white-piped caps to equip both Army Anti-aircraft Battalions and therefore some members of both battalions wore green-piped caps and shoulder straps.)

The two MG Battalions in 5th Light Division were issued with the green piped caps that had been intended for use by the motorized infantry ('Rifle') regiments of a Pz Div. The officers in the two MG Battalions continued to wear white piped sh/boards, with "M" and number cyphers, that they would have simply transferred from their Continental uniforms. (Such sh/boards were brought back as souvenirs picked up Libya in 1941/42 by Australian and NZ soldiers.) The NCOs and O/Rs had to wear the green piped tropical uniforms they were issued with. Have a look at the official AWM photo in "RAinA" of prisoners from MG Battalion 8 captured in Tobruk on 1st May 1941. These caps do not have a white soutache.

Photos taken of members of MG Battalion 8 captured during the abortive attacks against Tobruk of Easter 1941, and in later engagements, held in the the Australian POW camp near Dhurringile in Victoria clearly show the dark green color of the soutache on their faded caps. (See "Stalag Australia- German Prisoners of War in Australia" by Barbara Winter for examples of these photos or access the relevant photo collections in the Library of the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.)

By the end of the year both MG Battalions had been re-constituted as motorized infantry battalions and absorbed by the two Pz Divisions as a third battalion in their motorized infantry regiments. MG Btln 8 went to 104 Inf-Rgt (mot) in 21 Pz-Div. and MG Btln 2 went to 115 Inf-Rgt (mot) in 15 Pz-Div. So the green piping they had been issued with at the beginning of the year was now the correct piping.


Aufklärings-Abteilungen

There is also some confusion in collector circles regarding the use of gold yellow and copper brown (and pink) by the reconnaissance units (Aufklärungs-abteilungen) from 1940 to 1942/43. In the period we are discussing, 1940-1941, gold yellow was being replaced by copper brown. The simple facts are that there was no single changeover date for colours worn by troops in the field, or for that matter when the various firms manufacturing field caps and tunics with shoulder straps changed from one colour to another colour that was officially replacing it. These changes happened over a period of time, and often factories changed only when stocks of one colour may have been used up. The factories might not even have received their supplies of the new soutache or shoulder strap piping colours. Hence, the factories continued production using a colour that may have been on the verge of being officially superseded. A cap I saw for the first time last year, a 1942 dated field cap with copper brown soutache (maker Carl Halfar), is a prime example of this situation. Copper brown was meant to have been superseded by pink in 1942 for armoured reconnaissance units. Apparently nobody instructed the Halfar factory to stop making caps with copper brown soutache in 1942. There is no magic key we can use to apply here to understand in a black and white sense what was not a rigidly enforced system of colour allocation in the field.

As with the two shades of green Waffenfarbe, the older light green and the newer lime green, the two Aufklärungs-abteilungen serving in Africa in 1941 wore both gold yellow and copper brown, at the same time. My Gustav Thomas cap with its gold yellow soutache has a 1940 date. Thus it would have been made for issue to 3rdPanzer Division. Sadly I have no information on this cap’s origins. I do not know where and when it may have been picked up as a souvenir, and which unit may have worn it.

Many collectors take one list of Waffenfarben without understanding that it cannot be perfectly applied retrospectively or transposed to the future as a universal system for interpreting the use of arm of service piping used by the Wehrmacht. Too often we take a list of arm of service colours and try to make it apply to any number of periods, both before and after the time that list was composed and published. It will not fit such a neat paradigm.

Regarding copper brown I can definitely state it was in use with AA3 in 1941. (I have read some opinion that disputes this fact.) I have a cap with copper brown soutache (an undated or 1940 Schebeler) with the owner's name and his unit “3” on an embroidered name tape stitched to the lining. Being manufactured in 1940 would indicate this cap was also originally intended for use by 3rdPanzer Division, i.e. by AA3. The cap was picked up by a NZ officer at El Adem in early December 1941. I own five shoulder straps with copper brown piping (including two fitted to a tunic) that were picked up by NZ soldiers at Gambut Airfield on the morning of 23rd November after NZ 4th Brigade troops overran the lager AA3 had occupied overnight. Interestingly I also own a German overcoat picked up from inside a tent at Gambut on that morning which has had its sew in gold yellow officer piped shoulder boards cut off but leaving tufts of gold yellow woolen material behind on the seam. (I strongly suspect this desecration occurred postwar back in NZ with the culprits being the old soldier’s young children armed with a pair of scissors.)

It is my impression from reliable source- attributed souvenired insignia I have seen that in 1941 AA33 in 15.Pz-Div also used a combination of copper brown and gold yellow piped shoulder straps and field caps, as was the case with AA3.

For what it is worth I can say in all the years I have collected DAK material I have not seen or heard of an officer shoulder board in copper-brown that originated in North Africa. However I would say they existed, even though I have not seen one. It is likely that in 1941 all or nearly all officers serving both in AA3 and AA33 wore the gold piped yellow (or pink*) piped shoulder boards they would have transferred from their Continental uniforms.

* Pink-piped officer shoulder boards bearing a gilt metal Gothic “A” and the numeral “3” were souvenired by NZ soldiers when they captured Bardia in late January 1942.

[Mike Davis]

3249 4 officer straps 1941, obverse, 2 x hellgrün, 1 x resedagrüun, 1 hochrot

3251 above, reverse

Dal McGuirk: "Four officer shoulder boards I was given in 1981 by a former NZ Army Captain who led a survey and recovery team through eastern Cyrenaica in February-March 1942. The party criss-crossed the desert on a grid search working from aerial reconnaissance photos looking for anything worth salvaging and any battlefield graves that would have to be dug up and the bodies re-interred in one of the semi-permanent cemeteries in Egypt. They marked the co-ordinates on maps for the follow up group who would tow away whatever vehicles and weapons could be salvaged and disinter the bodies. The Captain picked up a collection of shoulder straps and shoulder boards he took from tunics and greatcoats they found in foxholes, in vehicles, trenches, wherever. The two boards on the left were obviously removed from tunics or greatcoats that had been out in the open for a couple of months and have faded from exposure to sun, rain, dew, and sandstorm. You can see the fine desert sand layered on the under surface of the left hand board. The other two boards would have been taken from tunics they found in vehicles, out of the direct sun and rain. These green-piped shoulder boards would have been worn by three officers who came to Africa with shoulder boards they were wearing on their Continental uniforms in 1940."



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[Mike Davis]

3240 Tobruk 1941 shoulder strap obverse

3241 Tobruk 1941 shoulder strap reverse

Dal McGurik: "A single strap I acquired in Australia in 1979 that had been picked up in Tobruk in 1941 by an Australian soldier. This shoulder strap would have belonged to a member of MG Battalion 8. It is a typical example of an early manufactured shoulder strap with its woolen piping and sage green cotton twill upper panel.”




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[Mike Davis]

Schebeler Grenadier wearing Schebeler cap with hellgrün soutache and very light colored lime green piped NCO straps

Dal McGuirk: “Photo showing German NCO soldier in 1942 wearing what I believe is most likely a cap made by the firm of Emil Schebeler with a soutache of light green (hell-grün) braid while his NCO shoulder straps are piped in the much paler lime green (reseda-grün).
(Australian War Memorial)

"UNLESS INDICATED OTHERWISE ALL ITEMS ILLUSTRATED ARE FROM THE AUTHOR’S COLLECTION”





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[naxos]

Great thread - Thank you Mike!

[Schulterklappen]

Thread

Thank you very much for sharing this! It should be a pinned thread.

[Beersheba4thLH]

Thanks Mike for sharing this information with us! Please pass our 'thanks' onto Dal McGuirk as well! It was very nice for Mr. McGuirk to do this.

[Schulterklappen]

MG Btl. 2 & 8, Pz. Gren Rgt. 104

Here are some examples from MG Bataillone 2 & 8 and Panzergrenadier Rgt. 104. The Pair of Oberfeldwebel Schulterklappen, from Panzergrenadier Rgt. 108, are of felt materials including the Waffenfarbe.

[afrikasandman]

I agree this needs to be pinned. I have been one of those for a long time that felt that any number of green colors were used and this really sinks it home. There is really no way to call certain green colors one way or the other (that is for Continental boards/soutached caps and or tropical ones).

WE know what was suppose to happen in regard to the color changes but again the factories used up their stocks before producing new. You see that today as well with US military uniforms. There was several changes to the ACUs, buttons were brought back and velcro sleeve bands and pocket flaps were done away with. It took almost a year to really see the button ACUs on the shelves because the factories used up their already produced stock before switching over.

Thanks for posting this Mike, I for one enjoyed the read and its good to see such a authority on DAK items make an explanation that based on years of experience and from getting great items that were brought back from the field.

Matt

[Schulterklappen]

Sonderverband 288

A pair of straps that belonged to a member of Sonderverband 288.

[Schulterklappen]

Max Karl

This pair of straps belong to a member of Pz. Gren. Rgt. 104.

[nonameno]

Hello Gentlemen,
Really a fantastic thread!
Thank you for starting this Mike and for the additions posted by others!
Best wishes,
Curtiss

[Willi Z.]

Yet another impressive scholarly analysis by Dal! Thanks Mike for posting it.

[longislandercjv]

I am greatly impressed by the information given by Mr. McGuirk;
The topic of "Green Waffenfarbe" has been a source of confusion and
debate for decades.
The use of "White Waffenfarbe" in Africa has also been an enigma.

Anyone who collects insignia will now be enlightened by Mr. McGuirk's
generous sharing of this information.

Most certainly, this thread should be pinned.

Thank you to Mike Davis as well.