Wachregiment swearing ceremony postcard

[iannima]

I had noticed this postcard on Ebay.de, and I knew that there was something odd about it. The cuff title was to be guessed as being made up of a short word followed by a long one, which matches "Nva Wachregiment" and the white piping on the shoulder boards made me certain that it was either the Engels or the Eberlein regiments. And yet there was something I could not quite account for....
I received it today...
The occasion is obviously a swearing in ceremony or Vereidigung. The cuff title is obviously the one I had guessed, so no surprises there. But if one looks carefully one notices that the belts must be the grey ones. These were indeed used for parades too for a certain period in the 1960s before they saw the errors of their ways ... but what I found most striking were the trousers: these are not Stiefelhose, but long trousers.

The fold with which the trousers is pulled at the back crease and folded towards the front and outwards before being stuffed into the Knobelbecher is just about visible. The boots too look like EM ones, but the trousers are the main evidence. Now all these things put together militate towards the entire uniform being made of Filz and not gabardine, that is in its being idenbtical to that of any other ordinary enlisted man in the NVA... EXCEPT... for the addition of the cuff-title
I had a suspicion that something like this had happened for the Felixe at some stage. Indeed David_H had even provided examples of removable cuff titles, but this one looks a bit more securely attached.
Why was this done? Perhaps soldiers wore these uniforms during their basic training and only switched to the finer gabardine ones later on. hard to tell now. I have a suspicion that these must be from the Eberlein regiment, but it is merely a suspicion...
Well there you are... another pointless detail about the Wachregiment

[vacollector]

I agree that uniform misques would make you think that this has to be the Wachregiment 2 Hugo Eberlein.

[tony james]

wooly tunic and pants and not gaberdine??

[Mike G.]

Wooly uniform. Enlisted boots. Steel helmet. Gray utility belt.
I too am thinking NVA-Wachregiment 2, Hugo Eberlein in Strausberg.

[vacollector]

Was the Wache Regiment 2 a combat unit?

[iannima]

Was the Wache Regiment 2 a combat unit?

Well... it depends on what you call a combat unit... their job was guarding the Ministry of National Defence Buildings in Strausberg and assorted various things. They did have APCs and they must have received some combat training like everyone else, but I doubt that they would have been fully comparable to an ordinary mot. Schützen Regiment.

[Mike G.]

Was the Wache Regiment 2 a combat unit?

Not in the context of the Wach-Rgt F. Dzierzysnki, which had an actual combat element and a specific combat mission.

The original NVA Wachregiment in Berlin was primarily a ceremonial guard regiment. The Wachregiment F. Engels that replaced the NVA Wachregiment in Berlin took on greater ceremonial duties, and expanded their ceremonial role to encompass all military elements of the NVA. Consequently, they had special uniforms for their unit that encompassed uniform examples of all NVA elements, to be used in some of their more elaborate ceremonies.

As Matteo stated, NVA Wachregiment Hugo Eberlein was primarily utilized in Strausberg as a guard force.

[iannima]

This has surfaced on ebay and it is said to refer to 1979 which would be consistent with the shoulder chords.



The interesting thing are the black leather belts. I have a doubt about the boots but there could be another case of Wachregiiment with uniforms in Filz (wool). I have posted this on my little Facebook page venturing a guess that it might be the NVA Wachregiment Nr 2 Hugo Eberlein, and a veteran of the said regiment (1971/72) has come forward confirming my guess. He says that the cuff title going all the way round the sleeve makes my identification correct. He also added that:

"... Die Kammgarnuniform wurde durch die Angehörigen nur auf der Wache, und dort auch nur auf bestimmten Objekten wie Ministerium, Wache Fontanestraße u.ä. getragen..."

(= the Gabardine uniform was worn by members {of the regiment} only on guard duty and then again only at specific places like the Ministry itself; the guard post in Fontanenstraße etc...)

When I pressed him on this point he confirmed that he wore a wooly uniform (Filzuniform) during his service in 1971/72. Cuff titles embroidered on Filz cloth have certainly surfaced in the past. So this further confirms...

[tony james]

Matteo
do you know of any " NVA wachregiment " that are made from the wooly material ? I've only seen the dzierzynski that used both wool and gaberdine .

[iannima]

No I have never seen one. Only photographs like these.

[tony james]

They probably only had them in gaberdine .the FD was a much larger military unit in the early.70's maybe justifying the added cost of manufacturing two different cufftitles .

[gigoo]

I was once told that the achselschnur was not worn with greatcoat. Photo proves it was. Only by this unit?

[tony james]

I believe by all NVA units .

[tony james]

Matteo
just for clarification : half cufftitle = #1 wachregiment which was ceremonial
Full cufftitle #2 hugo eberlein wachregiment

did the cufftitle change to one ( completely around the sleeve for both wachregiments ) after the dark collar was discontinued ?

[gigoo]

Thank you Tony...