wwii axis reenactment forum

When a new soldier joined his division was he always put into the ersatz battalion of the division first & issued his dog tag from that battalion?

I though he always kept the same ersatz dog tag he was initially issued with until he was promoted or lost it. That's why there are so many ersatz dogtags round. I could be wrong but I think that's how it went.

Dog tags were issued at the training unit and were only replaced by the field unit if the original was lost, if this was the case the new tag would have the details of the field unit on it, not the previous training unit.

Not always ersatz - Often Ausbildings........
and not forgetting that replacements could come from an existing (possibly decimated) unit and could keep that Erkennungsmarke........
Example - an Alte Haas from 16 Inf Rgt could be wearing a tag marked as such whilst serving in 116 Pz Div.

God, imagine the paperchase involved in finding relatives who fought in specific units...

Gott Mit Uns wrote:God, imagine the paperchase involved in finding relatives who fought in specific units...

Yes thats a very difficuilt thing.
I´ve found 4 EKM´s in the positions of the 25PzGr.Div. (1945 battlefield) and none have any direct connection with the unit!

Like said above, you´ll normally only get a new EKM when the old one was lost or damaged.
I´ve seen one example of when a (FJ) nco got a new EKM when joining a new unit, and he still had his old one.
But, this is the only example i´ve seen so far!

Also, i´ve seen a few (not much) example´s of soldiers getting a new EKM but with the old text!
Probably to save new paperwork..

Don´t forget that Soldbücher and Erkennungsmarke got issued only after the general mobalisation.
The soldier got his Soldbuch and Erkennungsmarke from the unit he was in at that time.
So for soldiers allready in a field unit, they got an EKM from that field unit and not an ersatz one.

Also, wounded soldiers who went back to an ersatz regiment during periods of transition for their original parent unit, could be issued with an ersatz erkennungsmarke.