Carl's newest militaria pictures

Thank you for the nice compliments as well as my greatest grattitude to Skipper for doing the posting for me.

Some explaining on these pics.

1) Solders entrenched at Rilly France. Skipper, if you know anything about that area-please let me know. This pic IMO, was the better of the two offered of these guys in Rilly.

2) A Gebirgsjager formation in the field. I don't know what regiment they were in----yet.

3) Cavalry/Recon unit at break somewhere in France.

4) These older soldiers drinking Bier-were most likely in a Security Division and or this pic was taken in 1940 and these older soldiers had not yet been transferred to "softer duty" in rear-echelon units, depot units and such.

5) As yet-an unnamed General serving in a GJ unit.

6) Totally obliterated German Halftrack just outside of Leningrads Gates. I THINK I may already know what unit they were in? When im more confident in who I think they were, ill post it here.

Skipper, once again, I OWE you greatly for this help in posting these pics here.

 

There are several:

1) Rilly la Montagne (near Reims) about 1.000 inhabitants
Rilly-la-Montagne

2) Rilly sur Loire Rilly-sur-Loire - Wikipédia 400 inhabitants.

Your picture was taken in 1940 , The hilly landscape makes me think of the Reims area , not the Loire valley.

 

Hi Skipper, thanks very much for the links. I will try them both out when the computer starts acting better. Also, this gives me more leads to go on and ill start looking through my stuff tonight.

Also, I might have more Award Ceremony pics for you as well as Destroyed vehicles, tanks, STUGs and some Grossdeutschland pics. Ill know by early next week.

 

More from Carl:

 

Thank you for posting these for me as well Skipper. ;-))

Explanations:

1) A Soldier from a Signals unit using the older style of Optics.

2) Short-barrelled STUG III w/ Panzergrenadiers on the march somewhere in Russia.

3) EKII awards ceremony. The soldier 5th from the right is holding his and you can see it's ribbon-otherwise-you can't tell what awards they are recieving. The Sergeant to the extreme right is the Kompanie Spiess.

4) Soldiers clowing-around at a Bunker. I don't know which Infantry unit they are---yet.

5) Pioneers clearin a path through some barbed-wire fences.

6) These men in the classroom photo are Pioneers. I don't yet know which unit they were from.

 

Aren't the guys in pic 5 wearing Adrians?

 

Hi Skipper, it sure looks like they are. I kinda wonder why Pioneers would be wearing French gear? unless-that was a form of camoflage they used in order to not be discovered by real French Soldaten. Wierd. Oh and this photo just arrived in the mail today-along with 19 others. Ill check later to see if it has any writing on the back and will get back here later with any info-or definately by Monday.

 

I really like that picture of the soldiers sitting around laughing having a break, i like how it contrasts all the other pictures you had gotten, really nice.

 

Great pics again, Carl! Congrats on purchasing them!

 

That's what I thought. These guys are clearly wearing French M-1931 Adrian helmets with the infantery insignia. either they are disguised or they are French. The rucksack however makes me think of the German bag, but then again they don't have the same outfit...

 

Hi Fg, Kai, Skipper,

Fg, Kai, thank both of you Gentlemen for the nice comments. Im glad some here are enjoying these pics as I had hoped ;-))

Hi Skipper, I contacted the seller and he said the men were Germans dressed as French soldiers. He told me he will send me more info on them a he has the uni info on them as well as possible names of he men in the pic. Not sure when he will send me that info though? Hopefully by Monday mornng ;-))

 

Thanks for telling me. So they were apparently wearing their own uniforms and swapped helmets , probably for fun , an ansked a buddy to make a "trench picture of enemy troops" for home.

 

Hi Skipper, that could be the case. The photo looks very "posed"to me. ;-)) Ill see if there is any writing on the back when I get it in and will let you know whats there.

PS, wish me great luck on 3 of 4 of those Guderian pics. I have sporadic internet access again andfear im not going to get any of them. If im not here in several hours-i am hoping to be back on Monday--C.

 

Good luck Carl.

The posing pictures would be from the Summer 1940 then. Thisis whne helmets were still on the battlefield and whne weather conditions allowed these kind of things. After August 1940 German authorities started cleaning up and confiscating weaapons etc... So I assume these guys were making fun during the cleaning of a trench in the place they were assigned to. From what I see some French infantry guys in the little house behind dug a small trench, but apparently faced heavy artillery (pak or Panzer, see the large hole in the house).

 

Hi Skipper, that sounds great to me. Im hoping that their unit is listed on the pic. I believe these guys to be Pioneers.

 

That wouldn't be too difficult. I you find out who was at Rilly (Reims) during the Summer of 1940 you will have the unit. I am afraid there were however several pioneer units , but the cleaning/securing of trenches was certainly part of their job.

 

Hi Skipper, thank you for that as well as thanks is advance. I couldn't post anything to you as I was having troubles with the internet all day yesterday-as well as a major thunderstorm developed and parked right oer the area I live in.

Oh and, yesterday I scored 11 more photo's for you-and these are the final ones for awhile.

These include:

1) Gebirgsjagers using Mine Detectors.

2) Troops at a French Cathedral.

3) EKII award ceremony-not a super great shot but fairly decent and one of three I was able to keep together.

4) EKII award ceremony pic Nr 2 of 3.

5) EKII award pic Nr 3 of 3.

6) One of two neat pics I was able to keep together. This one shows two Russian Hiwis and some Germans moving into town. The Hiwis are clearly seen in their Red Army uniforms and are lugging ammunition for the Germans.

7) Hiwi pic Nr 2, shows the same men and Hiwis moving through a burning town.

8) One of two pictures I managed to get that were part of about 7 pics showing soldiers from the Grossdeutschland Division. One pic shows a few of them relaxing and you can see their "GD" insignia on their shoulderboards as well as the Grossdeutschland Cufftitle.

9) GD pic Nr 2-shows a few of them standing next to a Lend-Lease M3A2 Sherman Tank that was knocked out at the Battle of Kursk.

10) Combat photo showing troops crossing a river andyou can see one of the advancing "waves" of Infantry on the other shore.

11) A pic of some Germans observing an Italian Officer looking at someones papers.

This is "it" for the time being. Im letting go of quite a few interesting pics because I have a sick Cat and that needs to be dealt with.

 

some more nice pics Carl!

while in france i saw many pics here and there in little antique shops etc and taught of you.....id say if you were there with me, you'd have been busy buying them all up