# Photo Identification



## FSTO (24 Nov 2020)

My daughter is an archivist for the City of Regina and came across this picture the other day,

The photo was taken by a German made camera and the film was developed at a Swiss pharmacy.

Questions:

What is RCASC - Service Corps of some sort I assume;
Are those Luftwaffe or Wehrmacht officers; and
What would "PW" mean ("Prisoner War" I assume)?

Any help will be appreciated.


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## tomahawk6 (24 Nov 2020)

Royal Army Service Corps is my guess.


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## Kat Stevens (24 Nov 2020)

Royal Canadian Army Service Corps
They look like Wehrmacht to me
Most likely Prisoner of War


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## FSTO (24 Nov 2020)

Target Up said:
			
		

> Royal Canadian Army Service Corps
> They look like Wehrmacht to me
> Most likely Prisoner of War



The POW's look pretty happy. Maybe this is an end of the war parade?


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## NavyShooter (24 Nov 2020)

There appear to be 5 people in the trailer/box thing.  

It looks like they are in a parade.

The two at the rear of the box appear to be females based on hair.

There appear to be two male german military personnel in the front - based on the uniforms.  They both have a tag on them that indicates "PW" - probably indicating that they are Prisoners of War.  They are both smoking/laughing/smiling.

There appears to be a third male between the two who appears to have a beret on - I think he is Canadian/British - possibly guarding/escorting the two PW's?

Behind the box/trailer appears to be a formed group of soldiers wearing Kilts (based on the semi-visible sporrans).

Not sure what else to say about it?


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## Good2Golf (24 Nov 2020)

FSTO, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a post-war or close to end-war event, and I’d be willing to bet those are actually Canadian soldiers wearing captured uniforms. My grandfather was a member of the Regina Rifles Regiment (RRR) and years later in the mid-70s he would take out some of the things he brought back from Europe including a full Wermacht Oberst’s uniform and peak cap and a large Wermacht battle/camp flag.  By ‘Swiss pharmacy’ do you mean processed/printed from a confirmed location in Switzerland?  Any date?

Regards
G2G


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## Old Sweat (24 Nov 2020)

The male wearing the beret behind the two men in German uniforms appears to be military police, except he is not wearing a red cap. I made this assumption as he seems to be wearing a white cross belt, which was a cross strap with white blanco applied to it. He would also have been wearing a white web belt, if this is the case. MPs used to wear this for visibility on duty, both "enforcing discipline" and performing movement control duties.


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## dimsum (24 Nov 2020)

Old Sweat said:
			
		

> The male wearing the beret behind the two men in German uniforms appears to be military police, except he is not wearing a red cap. I made this assumption as he seems to be wearing a white cross belt, which was a cross strap with white blanco applied to it. He would also have been wearing a white web belt, if this is the case. MPs used to wear this for visibility on duty, both "enforcing discipline" and performing movement control duties.



OS, I'm not so sure.  

The person in the centre doesn't look like he's wearing a beret - it's too close-fitting.  My guess would be that he's wearing a Wehrmacht field cap very far back on his head, so the brim is sticking up instead of out in front.  Also, the lighter patches by his neck seem to match the patches on the other two, and what looks like a cross belt may be a PW sign but pushed to the side and therefore slightly obscured by the person on the right.

My  :2c:


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## Old Sweat (24 Nov 2020)

Dimsum said:
			
		

> OS, I'm not so sure.
> 
> The person in the centre doesn't look like he's wearing a beret - it's too close-fitting.  My guess would be that he's wearing a Wehrmacht field cap very far back on his head, so the brim is sticking up instead of out in front.  Also, the lighter patches by his neck seem to match the patches on the other two, and what looks like a cross belt may be a PW sign but pushed to the side and therefore slightly obscured by the person on the right.
> 
> My  :2c:



Could be, and given the ambiguity of a contextless snapshot viewed on the smallish screen of my Mac Book is why I was less than definite.


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## FSTO (24 Nov 2020)

A little more information. The picture was developed at a drug store in Lower Saxony which ties in with the Canadians being in the region. The picture came with a group of other photos of Regina VE day celebrations. 

I'm thinking post VE in Europe and the prisoners are very happy they weren't going to be guests of Uncle Joe and his merry band of commissars!


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## Blackadder1916 (24 Nov 2020)

Old Sweat said:
			
		

> The male wearing the beret behind the two men in German uniforms appears to be military police, except he is not wearing a red cap. . . .



According to the virtual MP Museum, Canadian Provost did not wear red cap covers except for a few exceptions.  

http://mpmuseum.org/index3.html


> Although Provost had resisted wearing a red cap cover on the Service Dress cap, references were made in official correspondence to it's wear by Provost Companies in Western Canada. There is anecdotal evidence, supported by a few poor quality photographs, of the red cap cover being worn in Italy by a composite Provost section for a period of about one month. In any case, supplies of "Caps, Forage, Covers, Scarlet" were held by Canadian Ordnance stores until they were declared obsolete in 1947.


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## SeaKingTacco (24 Nov 2020)

I took it to be some sort of “mock” event (like a war bonds drive) with somebody dressed up in captured uniforms to raise funds.

It looks a little too contrived to me to be actual PWs on display.


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## Good2Golf (24 Nov 2020)

SeaKingTacco said:
			
		

> I took it to be some sort of “mock” event (like a war bonds drive) with somebody dressed up in captured uniforms to raise funds.
> 
> It looks a little too contrived to me to be actual PWs on display.



:nod:


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