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Vormarsch einer deutschen Infanterieeinheit in Polen

Advance of a German infantry unit in Poland, Source: BArch, Bild 101I-121-0002-05 / Boesig, Heinz

Military Formations and Units up to 1945

A digital version of the reference work “Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS 1939-1945“ by Georg Tessin (in German).

General Information

The series „Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS 1939-1945“ by Georg Tessin is a comprehensive reference work on the troop history of the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS during World War II. Although not exhaustive, it does provide a very comprehensive list of units, formations and command authorities and information on hierarchical structures. 

The 17 volumes of the series, scanned with automatic text recognition, can be downloaded on this page and used for independent research. Because it is possible to search within the volumes, the files are very large and take a long time to load.

It is highly recommended that you familiarise yourself in advance with the structure and characteristics of the series and the individual volumes. To assist you, we provide a compact „Anleitung“ (guide in German) below.

The editor of the work, Dr Georg Tessin, who held a leading position in the Military Archives Department of the Federal Archives after World War II, is understood to have been a committed National Socialist who supported the ideas of the Nazi regime. The series, which is often abbreviated under his name, should not be published without a critical contextualising of his character and work, which you will find below under the title „Georg Tessin - Eine historische Verortung“.

Another useful aid for the history of the troops is the organisational card index of the General Army Office. Compared to Georg Tessin’s publication, this is much more comprehensive, as it also includes references to small units below the regimental, battalion and division level. These include, for example, companies, platoons, squadrons or squads. Most of the organisational card index is available online. Missing index cards will eventually be digitised. You can use the following link to search through them. To make it easier for you to use, we have provided ‘instructions’ for this.

Due to the sheer size of the organisation index, we suggest you begin with Georg Tessin’s publication when researching units from regimental, battalion and division level upwards, as this makes it easier to get started. If the units you are looking for cannot be found in this publication, you should conduct a subsequent search in the organisational card index. For small units, however, it makes sense to begin with the organisational card index.

Please note that the organisational card index has not been preserved in its entirety and its internal order is partially disrupted. If you cannot find documentation of certain units in it, this does not mean that they did not exist. Regarding units that were formed towards the end of World War II, there are often no surviving index cards. In such cases, the last option is to search for the corresponding muster rolls and documentation on wartime troop strength in invenio, although this may not lead to successful results either.

Additional Downloads (in German)

Anleitung und Informationen zur Publikation “Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS 1939 – 1945“ (PDF, 815 KB, File does not meet accessibility standards) von Georg Tessin

Georg Tessin – Eine historische Verortung (PDF, 85 KB, File does not meet accessibility standards)

Anleitung und Informationen zur Organisationskartei des Allgemeinen Heeresamtes (PDF, 2.42 MB, File does not meet accessibility standards)

Contact

Department Militärarchiv (MA)

Wiesentalstraße 10
79115 Freiburg

Phone: 030 18665 - 5700
Email: militaerarchiv@bundesarchiv.de