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The LK5 marking - A new track

Stephan98k

aka 8x57IS
For years we've been trying to figure out what the LK5 marking means and we still haven't found an answer to this question.

Some of these rifles are in American collections, bringbacks without import marking, and another hotspot is France. From my observations the most of these rifles was manufactured in Germany (K98k 25% and M98 16,67%). French rifles have 33,33% and Czech, Yugoslavia, Greece and Russia share the remaining 25%. Of course it's important to know where these rifles were made and you can draw a lot of conclusions from that. In the same way important is, where these rifles were found or even better, where these rifles were captured and unfortunately this is known only in very rare cases. Some weeks ago I saw another LK5 marked K98k, this time a byf 41 and it's reported where this rifle was captured.

On September 16, 1944 the German Major General Botho Henning Elster surrendered with nearly 20,000 soldiers at the Loire bridge of Beaugency and this LK5 marked byf 41 was captured during the Elster passage. That made me curious, and I wanted to know where the Major General came from and where he was stationed before. From April 1943 to April 1944 Major General Elster was Feldkommandant (Field Commander) in Marseille and from April to August 1944 he was Feldkommandant in Mont-de-Marsan. On August 15, 1944 started the Operation Dragoon, the Allied invasion of Southern France. There was the danger of being kettle by this military Operation, and on August 16, 1944 Adolf Hitler ordered that Armeegruppe G (Army Group G) withdraw from southern France. During Operation Dragoon many German troops got kettled and surrendered to the American and French troops, but a lot tried to escape.

I have made a map:
LK5 Map.jpg
At the bottom is the Feldkommmandantur in Marseille and in western direction the Feldkommmandantur in Mont-de-Marsan, were Major General Elster was stationed. The path of Elsters withdraw is marked in red color. The withdraw of other German units is marked in blue color. The black dots are places were bigger German units surrendered and I didn't marked the withdraw route of these capitulating units, otherwise it would have become too confusing.

You can see, at Major General Elster withdraw route is a captured LK5 rifle and at the other main withdraw route are several captured LK5 rifles. I would say the unit were the LK5 rifles belong to, was stationed in Southern France. We always assume the LK5 have something to do with the Luftgaukommando 5, but maybe we should think about an other possibility. In this area served also a lot Ostlegionen (Eastern Legions), as example Indian Legion and Freiwilligen-Stamm-Division (Regular Volunteer Division) with Freiwilligen (Kosaken) Stamm-Regiment 5. Legion Kosaken 5 ? I don't think so. Maybe somebody has a good idea and we can finally get a answer to our question.

Certainly I forgot something important, but I'm busy now and I will write later more about this topic. I'm curious about your opinion.

Regards,
Stephan
 
I forgot to put a link to a video clip. Here is the surrender of German Major General Botho Henning Elster with his men: Surrender in Beaugency

At 04:38 it's interesting, in the close up you can see a lot K98k rifles and other types of rifles, notice the different sling attachment and they don't have take down discs.
 
Very interesting theories! The LK5 threads are always interesting due to the different ideas regarding the marking. I would assume these Eastern Legions would have gotten any weapons available which could explain the various Beutewaffen often seen? Ammunition supply would seem a headache. Waiting to see what others here think. To me it looks like possibly one Lebel rifle buttstock near the top right of the surrender pile.
 
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With unit marking forbidden by decree just prior to the outbreak of war, I would say this is not a viable theory. Add to that many of the examples I see show signs of rework, with electro pencilled numbers on replaced parts, with random numbers stamped at the wrist which don’t seem to be rack numbers, etc.

I like the work of narrowing down where these rifles come from, I hadn’t seen the byf41 evidence.


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I agree with both of you, I also don't think it's a unit marking. I rather think it's a marking for weapons, which was used by non-German combatants. I found already something promising, the background, time frame and area suits, I believe I'm close to the answer.
 
Another excellent thread due sticky status, thanks Stephan. I look forward to digging into it this evening.
 
I agree with mrfarb. All of my LK examples with the possible exception of a MAS 36 show German modifications of some kind, to include bluing the bolts, modifying the magazine follower, and numbering small parts. That sounds like depot work to me, and would seem to suggest that the LK indicates a processing facility of some kind.

Stephan, nice job on the map showing the movement of MG. Elster's unit. I agree with you that these all seem to have been recovered in France.
 
I agree with both of you, I also don't think it's a unit marking. I rather think it's a marking for weapons, which was used by non-German combatants. I found already something promising, the background, time frame and area suits, I believe I'm close to the answer.




Do any of the German K98k LK5 examples show evidence of depot repairs?
 
I think there is merit in your line of reasoning, not a unit marking but possibly related to some irregular units, its worth consideration. Naturally, most of the ones I have recorded are G98's, though French and 98k are close in number. Recently another showed up on GB (https://www.gunbroker.com/item/812754013) and like the rest show little signs of use, though all passed through depots at one point or another, typically for re-barrels (early barrels, but they stopped making G98 barrels before the war) or at least upgrades. Which suggest to me these rifles were not used much in the early phases of the war and could have been slated for some irregular or volunteer organizations later in the war. The latest 98k I have recorded is a dou/43, most are early pre-war production, but I do not follow this marking closely.

I still think LW related is most likely, but the truth of it is we are a long way from an answer... Stephan and Mike are good at this sort of reverse engineering of a problem, looking at a problem from its components or indirect approaches, naturally this often comes with speed bumps... but I think Stephan is on to something with the French angle, and possibly the volunteer/irregular angle.

Maybe see if you can see how these foreign "volunteers" were armed? How many were in France? How long, because most of these rifles look like they weren't trained with or used much. Many have original stocks or pretty clean stocks, nothing you would think a clumsy foreign recruit would put a rifle through...


I agree with both of you, I also don't think it's a unit marking. I rather think it's a marking for weapons, which was used by non-German combatants. I found already something promising, the background, time frame and area suits, I believe I'm close to the answer.
 
Maybe see if you can see how these foreign "volunteers" were armed? How many were in France? How long, because most of these rifles look like they weren't trained with or used much. Many have original stocks or pretty clean stocks, nothing you would think a clumsy foreign recruit would put a rifle through...

That (the training angle) is one that has some merit, given training photos of German troops using foreign rifles. However, I don't think it explains the depot 'treatment' they received.
 
It could explain it if all of the rifles intended for use by the unit were overhauled/checked before issue, such as the Volkssturm Carcano rifles. However, I don’t believe the marking would be applied as a mark of issue, whether you want to call it a unit mark or not.

The chart showing the movement is helpful, but only if you could show large numbers of weapons associated with them. Maybe look towards who supplied arms to this type of unit. Remember there are LK3 and LK4 marked examples that wouldn’t fit the unit you referenced.


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Do we know if arms were ever handed out to Vichy police or other armed forces at any point? Geographically, this would’ve been smack in the middle of the Vichy “Free Zone” (at least til 42-43, I think?).
 
That's a great discussion, thanks to all of you.

The chart showing the movement is helpful, but only if you could show large numbers of weapons associated with them. Maybe look towards who supplied arms to this type of unit. Remember there are LK3 and LK4 marked examples that wouldn’t fit the unit you referenced.
Mike, of course I agree with you and actually we would need many more examples to derive a theory from it. Mainly I wanted to show with my map that I think the weapons come from the south of France. Major General Elster's march group isn't the answer (I know it already), there is only one known LK5 example at the area where he surrendered. In the map I put the path of the main withdraw route of other German units in blue color, to point out at another main withdraw route. There are again LK5 rifles and in this case even a cluster with three rifles.

You are right and many of the examples show signs of rework, but not all of them. We have also some K98k rifles which show signs of rework, but again not all of them. The majority of these LK5 marked rifles are from Germany and France. The German rifles are mostly older pre-war models and K98k. The French rifles are up to early wartime. Pat is absolutely right, nearly all of the examples show German modifications of some kind.

I don't think the LK marking indicates a processing facility of some kind. It would be absurd to mark as example an original and not reworked K98k with a rework facility stamp.
The Germans had many captured French weapons in their weapon arsenals and they modified a lot of them. Many of these French rifles stayed unused in German weapon arsenals, later second-tier units got equipped with them, it was similar with the older German pre-war models. Usually they keep the new and good rifles for the troops at the main front and the rear area troops get the captured rifles and older German models.

On a site note, in the General Army Communications published by the Army High Command are also orders about French rifles, one example is about drilled holes in the barrel with the intention to cause accidents when German soldiers use these captured rifles. All unit Waffenmeister and Feldzeug departments got the order to check out French rifles before German units use these weapons.

From 1943 to 1944 these weapons were then needed for combatants and mostly they issued these stored weapons to the irregular units. I have records of it and even a precise date, if I have time tomorrow I will quote this.

Which suggest to me these rifles were not used much in the early phases of the war and could have been slated for some irregular or volunteer organizations later in the war.
Maybe see if you can see how these foreign "volunteers" were armed? How many were in France?
Paul, I have thought about exactly these things and have looked up in many books. I have found some answers and these answers reinforce my theory, or rather have brought me to it. These LK5 marked rifles come from the south of France.

I don’t believe the marking would be applied as a mark of issue, whether you want to call it a unit mark or not.
Mike, I call it a mark of issue or a geographic marking, not a unit mark. For several reasons it might make sense.

Yesterday I have read another book and at first I have to sort all my findings, it's like thousand pieces of a puzzle. I have to think about how I present everything and the quotes I want to prove with sources. It's difficult for me to express myself in a reasonably linguistic sense, as English is not my mother tongue and therefore it's very time consuming. Please excuse me if I make mistakes and because I let you wait for details. Tomorrow I'm quite busy, at latest on Saturday I should have enough time to write about the details.

Wolfsburg, you smack in the middle and you are already very close. You should continue with your thoughts about it.

Regards,
Stephan
 
Milice française - French militia

Background
The Milice française (French militia) was a paramilitary force during the Second World War in France, it was created on January 30, 1943. There was a close cooperation with the German security police (Sipo). The Milice participated in summary executions and assassinations, helping to round up Jews and résistants in France for deportation. It was the most extreme manifestation of fascism of the Vichy regime. Leader of the Milice was the far-right French politician Aimé-Joseph Darnand.

Since the autumn of 1940 existed the war veteran organization "Légion française des combattants" and Darnand recruited in the late summer of 1941 disappointed soldiers from this organization. These founded in the department Alpes-Maritimes a secret military organization under the name "Service d'ordre légionnaire" (SOL), which should be used in case of another Italian aggression against French territory. By the end of 1941, it had developed into a serious force outside the armistice-army, which received the official blessing of the Vichy regime in January 1942 as the protection of France from external and internal aggression.

When it became apparent that in January 1943, militants of the rival collaboration parties "Parti populaire français" (PPF) and "Rassemblement national populaire" (RNP) sought to form combat forces to fight the French Resistance, Darnand restructured the SOL to Milice française. Prime Minister Pierre Laval had obtained in December 1942 Hitler's permission to form a force for his personal disposal. Therefore, Laval regarded the Milice as his personal defensive authority commanded by Darnand. But Darnand saw himself primarily as a henchman to Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain.

Until the summer of 1943 Laval blocked all requests for arming the Milice. But with increasing escalation of the situation, the Waffen-SS considered the Milice an ideal recruiting ground for the deployment of a battalion of French Waffen-SS. In August 1943 Darnand was appointed Obersturmführer the Waffen-SS and laid in the rooms of the former German Embassy in Paris a personal oath of allegiance to Hitler. The Germans hesitated for a long time to arm the Milice. This happened after the publication of a decree in July 1943, with which the French were authorized to participate in the Waffen-SS. The Oberbefehlshaber West (High Command German Army Command in the West) commented on October 28, 1943: "An armament of the Milice is highly undesirable." Source: "Oberbefehlshaber West. Ic No.5289/43 secret from October 28, 1943. Subj.: Armament of the Milice."

Since this permission was granted for arming the Milice, it organized punitive expeditions against the communist Maquis. Ultimately a part of the Milice was armed, but the leaders had to commit themselves to recruit new soldiers for the Waffen-SS. The Milice was subordinated to the SiPo (Sicherheitspolizei - The Security Police was made up by the combined forces of the Gestapo (secret state police) and the Kriminalpolizei) and the SiPo initially prevented the attempts of Darnand to expand the field of activity to northern France. Only from January 1944 the Milice was allowed to operate in the northern zone. It served the Waffen-SS as a useful auxiliary force, especially in the fight against the Resistance.
The Milice replaced police forces and cooperated with the Gestapo. It had a security service led by Marcel Gombert, assisted by Paul Fréchoux, Henri Millou and Joannès Tomasi. It already participated in the winter of 1943-1944 in the bloody suppression of the Maquis.
From the spring of 1944, the Milice supported the Germans mainly in the partisan fight, the Milice was used for "auxiliary tasks" such as prison guards, executions or spying services.
The Milice is rarely mentioned in the Wehrmacht files during the summer of 1944. This is not unusual, because the HSSPF (Höherer SS- und Polizeiführer - Higher SS and Police Leader) was responsible for the Milice.
Because of their brutality, the Milice was quickly hated by its compatriots, even among indifferent populations. Where the Milice emerged, it found growing fear among the population as they did not shy away from any acts of violence.
Report on an interview with Sgt. Brough from February 10, 1944. There is written: „Source confirmed that the Maquis fear the French Milice more than anybody and he said they consider them to be more dangerous than the German soldiers and even more dangerous than the Gestapo."

Territorial organization - Departments
When the General Secretariat was established together with the government in Vichy, the Milice was based on a territorial organization, the departments.
The Milice was very active in Lyon, Marseille and Toulouse and other cities in southern France.

Number of personnel of the Milice
I will quote of the book "Konventioneller Krieg oder NS-Weltanschauungskrieg?" by Peter Lieb:
"Overall the Milice counted with their sub-organization, the Franc-Guard, a maximum of about 30.000 members. But only half was active and lightly armed." Peter Lieb used the source "Vgl. AN, AJ40/1210, dr. 1. Control-inspection of DWStK. Control-department. Az. 33 d No. 423/44 secret from April 4, 1944. Subj..: French militia."

The weapons of the Milice

Initially they were equipped only with handguns. In fact, they were only slowly and gradually armed - only in the autumn of 1943, after numerous attacks on their members, they received a few British submachine guns, which have come from aid supplies from the Allies to the Resistance and got captured. From January 1944, the Milice got rifles from the Germans of the French armistice-army and in March 1944 they could form a division of machine guns and a mortar to participate in the action attack of the Maquis des Glières. They were equipped with British Sten submachine guns, French machine guns and French rifles MAS 36, among others. The first two units were engaged experimentally in cities, Lyon and Annecy.

A few engagements of the Milice
I will write in short form about three engagements in which the Milice was involved, the list isn't complete.
In January 1944 - March 1944 they was fighting against the Maquis des Glières, a Free French Resistance group. The battles was eastern and western of Lyon, engaged was 3.000 German soldiers, 1.400 Vichy policemen and 700 Milice combatant.
In May 1944 – June 1944 they was fighting against the Maquis du Mont Mouchet, a group of French resistance fighters. They fought together with Vichy policemen and German soldiers. These battles was south-western of Lyon, in South of France.
In July 1944 – August 1944 they was fighting against the Maquis du Vercors and again together with German soldiers. The battles was south-eastern of Lyon, again in South of France.

Withdraw of the Milice – August 1944
In August 1944, Darnand ordered the general withdrawal of the Milice. But members of the Milice still took part in some battles on French soil alongside the Germans after that date.




Some things and thoughts that could be important
Since the autumn of 1940 existed the war veteran organization Légion française des combattants. The German translation of Légion combattants is "Legion Kombattant". That might be an explanation, but I don't think that's it and it doesn't make sense.

The secret military organization Service d'ordre légionnaire was founded in the department Alpes-Maritimes, it is located in the south-east of the country in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. The French departments are numbered and the Département Alpes-Maritimes is the 6th Département.

The Milice was very active in the Département Hautes-Alpes and the surounding departments. Keep in mind the most common LK marked rifles are marked with LK5. The Département Hautes-Alpes is the 5th Département. A coincidence? I don't think so.
In the past I often thought of the word "Landkreis - rural district" because "LK" is a common abbreviation for it in Germany. But I have repeatedly rejected this idea, because I didn't recognize any sense in it. Until a few days ago I didn't know that the French departments are numbered and when I saw the coincidence with the 5th Département, I was very surprised.
I don't know if it's the correct explanation, but at least it could make some sense.

Another important hint is a German used VZ24 rifle, from the user Toulon44. On the left side of the stock of his rifle is written "pris aux boches pour la libération de bourgoin Sg fousse 1944". On August 23, 1944 the small town of Bourgoin was liberated. The town Bourgoin is located just around 32 miles south-eastern of Lyon. Again in the near of Lyon, another coincidence?
Here is the link to the rifle: LK5 marked rifle

Like I have written in my first post, on August 15, 1944 started the Operation Dragoon, the Allied invasion of Southern France. Keep in mind, in August 1944, Darnand ordered the general withdrawal of the Milice and on August 16, 1944 Adolf Hitler ordered that Armeegruppe G (Army Group G) withdraw from Southern France. Especially the members of the Milice had good reasons to retreat north with the Germans, you can imagine what the Résistance and even normal people did with them when they surrendered. As a German soldier you had better chances of survival in this area than a Milice combatant. Some Milice combattants could withdraw with the German troops and I have read they was pushed later into SS units.

Southern France was the operational area of the American and French armed forces. That would also explain why the majority of LK5 rifles are in French and American collections.

I nearly forgot to mention the LK marking. I call it a mark of issue or a geographic marking and I think the Germans was responsible for it, not the French combattants. Maybe in this way they tried to keep some control about these rifles or track them. I also don't have an answer to this question.

Map 1.jpg Here is again the same map and this time I have marked the 5th Département Hautes-Alpes.
Map 2.jpg In this map you can see the 3rd, 5th, 7th and 9th Département.

Milice a.jpg Milice b.jpg

What do you think about my theory?

Regards,
Stephan
 
The theory sounds plausible. It would definitely explain why French weapons are likely to have the LK marking.
 
This is very interesting, for a certain reason. Do you have more background informations? From which corner of Bavaria comes the rifle?

From what I was told, the rifle was found near Pfaffenhofen (south of Ingolstadt). But no prove for that story.
If I remember right, the seller came from the Ingolstadt area too. I'll look it up in my gun records and let you know.
 
I think Stephan is catching on to something here for one I appreciate him looking into the LK5 marking this week. I contacted him last Sunday about the LK5 marking because I had just bought a Gew98m with that marking on the buttstock. The auction never said anything about it and I saw it in one of the small corners of the pictures posted on the auction listing. It too is a vet bringback with a duffle cut stock. I have asked the seller for more information on the veteran if there is any, but have yet to hear back.

Hopefully will get the rifle sometime next week and will get a complete picture and data sheet posted up on the forum.

Again Stephan thank you for taking the time on this for me. I know you have been busy with research on German Kriegsmarine marked rifles, and the Letter "P" and letter "K" marking on K98k stocks" plus on "K98k Laminate Stock Date and Supplier Codes". So I'm hopefully I didn't cost you any of your sleep time by making you dig through even more research documents!
 
Interesting discussion for sure. In watching the video Stephen linked showing General Elster's surrender of his troops, the narrator stated that he had Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine troops under his command. These were second line troops, in a second line static defense / occupation area. I would almost go so far as to say such troops appear armed with more non-K98ks than K98ks from period pics of them in France. We all know there are numerous period photographs of German occupation troops in France armed with all of the rifles with the LK5 stamp, e.g., Berthier carbines, Dutch Mannlicher carbines, Belgian M.89/36, MAS.36, R.35 Lebels, Vz.24s, Gew.98s, Kar.98a, etc., etc.

All of these rifles would require accumulation, inspection, repair if necessary, and processing before issue. I believe that is what the LK5 mark represents. I do not believe it training, I believe it to be the depot / facility in occupied France which accumulated, inspected, and repaired, if necessary, those weapons to be issued to those mainly second line, occupation troops in France. That they turn up with a possible connection to foreign volunteer units is to be expected because they were second line units which would be issued such weapons. These troops were swept up into Gen. Elster's command which he surrendered.

My thoughts, FWIW, subject to change ;)
Edit- But in thinking about it, if it was a depot it had to have been one of decent size so why haven't we identified it? I think this mystery needs solving. Where's Scoobie Doo?

Regards,
HB
 
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