"German sailors in WW2" Topic

I'm currently putting a 28mm CoC force for late war Ostfront battles in Germany together.

That means a lot of Hitler Jugend, Volkssturm and other non-Heer formations.

I can use a lot of the available mini's as Luftwaffe ground troops (Will probably go for Artizan with Zeltbahns), but would like to include some Kriegsmarine troops as well.

From many accounts most Navy personnel was uniformed just as the Heer, just with variant colours, as the Luftwaffe ground guys.

However, I would like to have a more distinct look for my Navy troops.

I know of the very characterful models from Brigade Games, but find them a bit too Pulp.

The line made by Paul hicks here:

link

Looks interesting, but I have no clue what the differences in uniform are from these to the WW2 Kriegsmarine….

Anyone know if they are too far off to be used in WW2?

One distinctive item of equipment is the navy double beasted jacket, which some naval troops wore in WW2.

Those figures would be fine as they so lightly equipped. Black rifle pouches and boots, do the hats as sailor hats.

I can't recall what waffenfarbe naval troops wore, but chest eagles were yellow, so just hand paint a few of those on.

Here is a picture from the Dragon Models box of German sailors from Dieppe 1942 – they do have a somewhat distinctive look

auction

Well, those look interesting.

I like the U-Boat commander in his captured pattern denim BD jacket.

I don't know what jackets the two beardy guys are wearing, possibly leather U-Boat jackets. No-one seems to be wearing the double breasted naval pea jacket.

I'm a Norway enthusiast, so I'm always on the look-out for Kreigsmarine kitted out as infantry. The only off things about the Red Sailors is the vertical bandoliers -- what we think of as FJ-type bandoliers. I'm probably going to get some anyway. The only other candidate that I'm aware of is the Askari German sailors in watch coats: link and possible the officers here could have some kit from the various plastic Heer kits: link

Oh, if you don't mind more submarine kit, as in the Warlord pack referenced above, Artizan does some: link and link

As always, great response from this forum…

Will probably go with the Warlord box reinforced by the Paul Hicks figures – I like the older weapon types carried by those guys :-)

I feel compelled to add, if a figure company came to me and said "Jeff Ewing, we recognize your marketing genius, please tell us what our next pack of Germans should be," I'd tell them to do a whole section of guys in zelts. It's pretty much the ultimate in versatility. My second choice would be infantry in fliegerblusen. As it is, I'm thinking of kit-bashing some of Artizan's Panzer Lehr troops. LFD are also extremely versatile, fighting on all fronts and ranging from elite (Herman Goering Division) to conscript quality.