SS-Totenkopfverbände uniform on this man?

[yarmouth]

Hello everyone! Once more I have another question concerning a photo I have. Is this man a member of the SS-Totenkopfverbände? I tried to find a similar tunic on the web but can't find one. This one has no epaulette's. What time period would also be a great help. The size of the photo would of been used in an ID book. Thanks!

[TrondK]

It looks like a m36 tunic. I am no expert on SS, so that part i have to leave to the students of this organitation.

[HPL2008]

"Death's Head" collar patches and Army-style field blouses were worn both by concentration camp- / Totenkopfverbände personnel and members of the Totenkopfdivision.
If a photo does not show additional distinguishing features (such as a cuff title or distinctive branch color piping), it is impossible to tell whether it is of a member of the former or the latter group.

(There are more circumstancial indicators, too. For example, an elderly private is most likely a camp guard, whereas an array of combat decorations points towards a T-Division member. This is not 100%, though.)

The picture was most likely taken during the early- to mid-war years, but could be of a later date as well.

[yarmouth]

"Death's Head" collar patches and Army-style field blouses were worn both by concentration camp- / Totenkopfverbände personnel and members of the Totenkopfdivision.

If a photo does not show additional distinguishing features (such as a cuff title or distinctive branch color piping), it is impossible to tell whether it is of a member of the former or the latter group.

The picture was most likely taken during the early- to mid-war years, but be of a later date as well.

Is it normal for the tunic not to have epaulette's?

[HPL2008]

Is it normal for the tunic not to have epaulette's?

This is sometimes seen in photographs. He is most likely a very fresh recruit.

Another possibility is that this is an ID picture for a POW or a member of a probationary-/penal unit stripped of rank and badges, although in those cases I would expect the collar patches to have been completely removed as well.

[yarmouth]

I know the picture is poor in detail. I did my best to sharpen it.

[Dean]

Looks like an early one . This TK is vertical .

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Here for orientation are Delich Schatzkammer examples.

[Dean]

Many thanks FB, and also to Mr. Delich for the release of the pics of these fine items from his important collection.
Dean.

[Manfred WA]

This looks to me like a POW photo. I ran across a Polish site a year or two ago that had a huge database of POW pictures of Auschwitz/Birkenau personnel. That section only exists today, barely, in the Alzheimic electronic brain of Archive.org: Załoga SS KL Auschwitz - Pamięć.pl - portal edukacyjny IPN Scroll down and pick on a letter and you'll get a few pictures and if you click on one, you may or may not get the full picture. Also, it doesn't seem to go past page one on any of the of the alphabetized names. I saved much of this that is hopefully on another HDD.

From memory, one of the things I started to notice was that the POWs seemed to all be wearing the same caps, ill fitting or not. If an officer was photographed, a peaked cap was worn and everyone else had the same Schiffen with Totenkopf. I also seem to recall that the NCOs were all crammed into the same jacket with silver Tresse around the collar. In this, case, shown above, perhaps the mans identity card that he would have been holding has simply been cut out of the picture so it could fit the size limits of some website, etc.

The Polish site continues to exist but if that listing of A/B personnel with photos is still there, I haven't found it: Pamięć.pl - portal edukacyjny IPN