German WW1 Company Organisation

[Simon127]

Hi all,

Does anyone know how many companies you might find in a German Infantry Regiment or Reserve Infantry Regiment? I recently looked again at the unit markings on my German WW1 Bugle which is marked 'RIR 229 / 19 K' which I understand to be for Reserve Infantry Regiment, 229, 19th company. I did not think that there were as many companies as that in a Regiment(I did find on another post a reference to there being 16 companies in one RIR).

ANY help most welcome!

S

[Ralph J. Whitehead]

The standard for active and reserve regiments was 12 infantry companies (3 battalions) and one MG Coy. The number of MG Coy often rose to three by the latter part of the war.

In some cases an infantry regiment had 4 battalions and 16 companies but this was the exception, not the norm.

Ralph

[Simon127]

Thanks Ralph - I have since solved the mystery: I checked the bugle. The stamping is in fact '9 K' but this has been later restamped directly over the nine with a '0' and to the left of this a '1', using the existing K to make it 10th company. Because the numbers applied the second time are larger, the 9 sits almost inside the 0 so only upon closer examination can you see the final stamp is not 19th company at all but 10th company.

Thanks for your help!