Help ID unit.

[shroman]

[ChrisA]

Hello

From this photo it is impossible to ID the unit. What can be said is what type of unit it is. According to the tactical marking it is a element of a Infanterieregiment. Looking at the vehicle and the motorcycles I would say either a Krad-Erkundungszug or a Kradschützenzug of a regimental HQ company or HQ.

\Christoph

[shroman]

You are mistaken

You are mistaken. On a photo not a tactical sign.

[DRm]

WH 213038 belongs to AufklKomp.1 of Inf Div.23

[ChrisA]

Ah OK... Would have been helpful to see the second image also when asking this question.
DRm ... What source do you have for the link between the number plate and 23.Inf.Div.?

\Christoph

[Akira Takiguchi]

It's a matter of labor to collect licence numbers from various documents (however far from complete), but certainly lucky to find a specific number requested in someone's database.

Of course if you find a number in a document it just confirms that at one time the vehicle belonged to the unit, but looking at the unit marking, it appears to be a typical 1941 Heeregruppe Nord symbols, thus 23.I.D.(neu) is very probable I think.

[ChrisA]

Hello Akira

I also have a database with 2675 identified license plates but I just wanted to know if he has another source than a personal collection. I am looking for such documents for years now and was not able to find a source for these numbers. Looked through nearly all BAMA sources which have to do with "Kraftfahrwesen".

Another bad thing for us is that from a certain date on some types of vehicles got their number in the factory and were then delivered mixing these numbers all around again.

\Christoph

\Christoph

[Larry deZeng]

I can say that the Military Intelligence Research Section (M.I.R.S.) of M.I. 14/War Office, working hand-in-hand with the Ministry of Economic Warfare, very actively gathered intelligence on German (especially Wehrmacht) license plate numbers and ended the war with a very large data base of them. They had intelligence coming in from the factories in Germany, from resistance networks in occupied Europe, and even from ULTRA and "Y" Service intercepts. Why, you might ask? Here is just one use provided by this data base: single-engine PR aircraft would pass low over roads, villages and towns and photography vehicles. The photo interpreters back in the U.K. could then match the vehicle to a unit. Same thing on the ground. The license plate numbers reported by the resistance could often be used to identify the unit. M.I.R.S./M.I. 5 would use this information together with other intelligence for compiling their daily, weekly and monthly Order of Battle estimates.

How do I know this? Because I personally came across frequent evidence of it while trawling through WW II intelligence documentation in the archives years ago. Whether or not this valuable collection of historical data still exists in the British National Archives is unknown.

--Larry

[Akira Takiguchi]

Christoph, my "guess" was that our friend DRm had a chance to look thru 23.Infanterie-Division documents for his research. Sorry if I am wrong!