Some Nice Imperial Helmets

[Bill D.]

Awesome helmets !

What's next? The Kaiser's own uniform ???

[Daniel Griffin]

Thanks for the kind words , unfortuneatly no ID

Regards , Dan

[Bob Lembke]

"feldgrau" Dave;

The officer's helmet would be for the Garde=Reserve=Pionier=Regiment (GRPR), the unit that supplied all Flammenwerfer services to the German Army in WW I. The Sturm=Bataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr) (SBR) always had one Zug of GRPR assigned to it, as did the other storm battalions. (Some GRPR companies had an additional Zug of flame-throwers structured somewhat differently to better serve the needs of the storm battalions, as opposed to regular infantry.) My father, being in the 2. Kompagnie G=R=P=R, in the same general area as where SBR was based, often has this duty with SBR. (He loved fighting with these skilled professionals.) The GRPR periodically rotated these Zugs out of the storm battalions and replaced them, probably to remind the storm battalions that they did not "own" these detachments, as well as for refit. GRPR was the largest storm unit, twice as big as SBR, which itself was twice the size as the other storm battalions were, but since it did not fight as a unit, it is not that well known.

Kronprinz Wilhelm (who not only promoted the flame-thrower concept, but actually bank-rolled the GRPR for a while out of his private purse) asked his father (the Kaiser) to allow GRPR men to wear the Toten Kopf on the left lower sleeve. The Kronprinz sent the GRPR a letter passing his approval for this award (the Death's Head was a private emblem of the Kronprinz) after their 150th flame attack, in mid-1916. (I have the date and text of the letter somewhere.)

I have never heard of them wearing the emblem on the helmet (the letter does not specifically mention officers at all), and by the time of the award all the GRPR were going into combat in steel helmets, but we have all seen photos of parade formations where the EM wear steel helmets while the officers wore the then decorative Pickelhauben. The GRPR, and especially the 2nd Company, stationed in the same town where the Kronprinz had his HQ, were frequently visited and reviewed by the Kronprinz and even his father, its royal patrons (my father recounted and wrote about having caged cigarettes from the Kronprinz several times, and wrote that the Kronprinz liked to have a company of flame-throwers about {for roaches?}, and told a funny story about his company being reviewed by the Kaiser, who totally flustered a hapless Pionier that he addressed, who then got chewed out by his sergeant.) So one can imagine that officers would like to have a good appearance and perhaps flatter the Kronprinz with his emblem.

The GRPR was the only unit awarded the Death's Head in the whole war, the honor was only to be for the duration, as per the letter. Several old famous units had worn the Death's Head for many years.

Bob Lembke

[Dave Mosher]

Bob
My information states that in 1918 all Flammenwerfer were part of the GRPR, except for one flame thrower detachment included in Sturm-Batln Rohr, which was created when the batallion was created in April 1916 as part of Armee Abteilung Gaede. Also, according to an article by Dr. K. G. Klietmann in the Orden and Militaria Journal Nr. 21, 3. Jahrgang April 1977, "Der Offizierhelm des Flammenwerfertrupps des Sturm-Batalaillons Nr. 5 (Rohr) vom Jahre 1916," there is evidence that the flame thrower detachment of the Sturm-Batln Rohr was granted to wear the spiked helmet of the guard pioneers with a deaths head superimposed on the front plate. Food for thought.

Regards

Dave

"feldgrau" Dave;

The officer's helmet would be for the Garde=Reserve=Pionier=Regiment (GRPR), the unit that supplied all Flammenwerfer services to the German Army in WW I. The Sturm=Bataillon Nr. 5 (Rohr) (SBR) always had one Zug of GRPR assigned to it, as did the other storm battalions. (Some GRPR companies had an additional Zug of flame-throwers structured somewhat differently to better serve the needs of the storm battalions, as opposed to regular infantry.) My father, being in the 2. Kompagnie G=R=P=R, in the same general area as where SBR was based, often has this duty with SBR. (He loved fighting with these skilled professionals.) The GRPR periodically rotated these Zugs out of the storm battalions and replaced them, probably to remind the storm battalions that they did not "own" these detachments, as well as for refit. GRPR was the largest storm unit, twice as big as SBR, which itself was twice the size as the other storm battalions were, but since it did not fight as a unit, it is not that well known.

Kronprinz Wilhelm (who not only promoted the flame-thrower concept, but actually bank-rolled the GRPR for a while out of his private purse) asked his father (the Kaiser) to allow GRPR men to wear the Toten Kopf on the left lower sleeve. The Kronprinz sent the GRPR a letter passing his approval for this award (the Death's Head was a private emblem of the Kronprinz) after their 150th flame attack, in mid-1916. (I have the date and text of the letter somewhere.)

I have never heard of them wearing the emblem on the helmet (the letter does not specifically mention officers at all), and by the time of the award all the GRPR were going into combat in steel helmets, but we have all seen photos of parade formations where the EM wear steel helmets while the officers wore the then decorative Pickelhauben. The GRPR, and especially the 2nd Company, stationed in the same town where the Kronprinz had his HQ, were frequently visited and reviewed by the Kronprinz and even his father, its royal patrons (my father recounted and wrote about having caged cigarettes from the Kronprinz several times, and wrote that the Kronprinz liked to have a company of flame-throwers about {for roaches?}, and told a funny story about his company being reviewed by the Kaiser, who totally flustered a hapless Pionier that he addressed, who then got chewed out by his sergeant.) So one can imagine that officers would like to have a good appearance and perhaps flatter the Kronprinz with his emblem.

The GRPR was the only unit awarded the Death's Head in the whole war, the honor was only to be for the duration, as per the letter. Several old famous units had worn the Death's Head for many years.

Bob Lembke

[Bob Lembke]

Dave
I know I am beating this to death, and I feel that I may seem to be argumentative, tedious, and uncollegeal, but here goes.

A number of things indicate, to me, that all flame-thrower (FW) Zugs and Trupps serving with Sturm=Bataillon Nr.5 (Rohr) were formations of the GRPR.

First, my father, who was detailed to the SBR to provide FW support, never was a member of SBR. I have his Militaer=Pass, which records about 15 transfers he made between about nine formations, including five different components of the GRPR. He could not have been transferred into the SBR from the GRPR, a very different unit, without it being recorded in the Pass. He did speak often of the SBR, never mentioned having been in it in that sense.

This raises the possibility that SBR had both GRPR and SBR FW Zugs. None of my sources, mentioned later, seem to suggest this. Also, the GRPR had about 1400 to 1600 men in various kinds of support formations to provide various services to these highly technical field units, their about 36 field FW Zugs. How could the SBR justify reproducing even part of these support formations, and without these services, how could SBR keep a FW Zug at top form? Wouldn't it be especially weird if they also had GRPR FW Zugs?

I have over three hundred pages of material written by officers of the GRPR, including Major Dr. Reddemann, the GRPR founder and CO, and none of it seems to even hint at such an arraingement. Reddemann did specifically describe how he rotated FW Zugs into storm battalions, and then out, either back to their parent company or back to GRPR HQ, which had about 500 support personnel on site, for refit, re-training, and de-briefing by staff. He also seems to suggest that he did so so as to maintain his control and possession of his detailed Zugs.

I also have the official history of SBR, written by Graf Eberhard von Schwerin, formerly Adjutant of SBR (Willi Rohr died in the 1920s). I have not read it cover to cover, but have skimmed thru it, and it seems to mention the flame-throwers infrequently, their MG, mine thrower, and infantry gun detachments much more. Repeatedly von Schwerin does mention "FW of the Flame-thrower Regiment", but admittedly that does not exclude them from having some of their own as well. Interestingly, he heads the FW section of his 20 page table of the war dead with: "Flammenwerfer (Kleif)=Trupp". Only 14 FW=Pioniere are listed, indicating this listing is quite incomplete, which might mean that the SBR did not have the FW personnel data. (The 14 dead all seem to be from my father's 2nd GRPR Company.) The FW devices provided to the SBR were only Kleif units for a while, rather the "Wex" unit for quite a bit more time. Also, using "Trupp" is a bit odd, as they had a Zug of FWs, probably 6-7 Trupps. (However, sometimes "Trupp" can also mean a small unit not specifically a Trupp of about ten men, like to word "detachment". In short, the treatment of the FW elements by von Schwerin suggests some mix of disinterest and even possibly some ignorance, hinting that they were not actually part of the SBR.

My study of a SBR Militaer=Pass of a machine gunner suggests that SBR machine gunners also may have reported or had some linkage with some sort of MG entity outside of the SBR, like I maintain the SBR FW Zugs were all from the GRPR.

SBR (not called that yet) got its first MG detachment on October 18, 1915, and shortly after got its first light mine-thrower and FW Zugs. The "Sturm=Abteilung" was formed on March 4, 1915 in the Rhineland. Willi Rohr took the Abteilung over on September 13, 1915, and the growing unit was called a "Sturm=Bataillon" on April 1, 1916, but had been set up over a year earlier. Detachment Reddemann, the GRPR parent unit, was established in December 1914, and carried out the first FW attack on February 26, 1915, so it actually pre-dates SBR.

Finally, the information from Dr. K. G. Klietmann seems to contradict the idea that the SBR FW zugs could belong to the SBR. " there is evidence that the flame thrower detachment of the Sturm-Batln Rohr was granted to wear the spiked helmet of the guard pioneers with a deaths head superimposed on the front plate." If the FW detachment was part of the SBR, they could not possibly wear the spiked helmet of the Garde=Pioniere, as SBR was not a Prussian Guard detachment, while GRPR was, despite the SBR having been given the honor of wearing the Litzen. They only got their own insignia of honor, KP Wilhelm's metal "W" on the lower left sleeve of the blouse, in 1918. Reddemann, who knew the Kronprinz well, specifically said that the GRPR was the only unit in the German Army given the right to wear the Death's Head during the entire war. That should exclude the SBR.

Incidentally, the first CO of the SBR's FW Zug was not, strictly speaking, an officer (Offizierstellvertreter May).

Regards, Bob

[Tony & Kaiser]

And here we have yet another helmet from the flame thrower detachment of the Sturm-Batln Rohr with a deaths head.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...tem=2220172532