Marsch Btl "Afrika /78" in Soldbuch

[Albert]

Dear All,

I am going thru my Wehrpasses and Soldbuchs and have found this tag in a Soldbuch:

Private Ebbinghausen
is assigned as a field cook to
Marsch Btl "Afrika / 78"

Now what unit is that? I can't find anything on the net. Let me know if I need to post any more info (pages) from his SB and /or WP to help answer the question.

Thanks and best regards,

Albert

[Albert]

Units he served with as recorded in his Wehrpass:

[Albert]

ToO he served at as recorded in his Wehrpass:

[Albert]

ToO he served at as recorded in his Wehrpass, continued:

[Albert]

ToO he served at as recorded in his Wehrpass, continued 2:

[phil1942]

Marsch batallions were simply temporary transit units formed for the purpose of moving troops from the continent to Afrika.
It is very common to see these units mentioned in DAK documents.
Commonly they were formed in Italy and lasted for the duration of trip to afrika, where the men were then allocated into actual field units.
Your man here was assigned to Marsch Batallion 78. That was one of the last formed Marsch batallions and in fact never made it to Afrika.
You can see in his wehrpass that he was then diverted to Sardinia.
People commonly mistake the evidence of an Afrika Marsch batallion as proving that the soldier set foot in Afrika, however a number of the later Marsch batallions were diverted to Sicily, Sardinia etc due to the imminent collapse in Tunisia.

[Albert]

Hi Phil,

Thank you very much, it makes perfect sense now.

Best regards,

Albert