A very rare photo identity paper known as the Troop Identity.  Issued to Oberwachtmeister Otto Wehring in the Reichswehr in 1923 with Artillerie Regiment Nr 5 –  He was one of the 100,000 standing army…  Interestingly the II Batt, that Wehring was in was in Bayern, and the Reichswehr took part in the downing of Hitlers Putsch in 9 November 1923. If Wehring was present, we will not know, but he certainly was in active service at the time in a very small army.  —–   Reichswehr (lit. ’Reich Defense’) was the official name of the German armed forces during the Weimar Republic and the first years of the Third Reich. After Germany was defeated in World War I, the Imperial German Army (Deutsches Heer) was dissolved in order to be reshaped into a peacetime army. From it a provisional Reichswehr was formed in March 1919. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, the rebuilt German army was subject to severe limitations in size, structure and armament. The official formation of the Reichswehr took place on 1 January 1921 after the limitations had been met. The German armed forces kept the name ‘Reichswehr’ until Adolf Hitler’s 1935 proclamation of the “restoration of military sovereignty”, at which point it became part of the new Wehrmacht. Although ostensibly apolitical, the Reichswehr acted as a state within a state, and its leadership was an important political power factor in the Weimar Republic. The Reichswehr sometimes supported the democratic government, as it did in the Ebert-Groener Pact when it pledged its loyalty to the Republic, and sometimes backed anti-democratic forces through such means as the Black Reichswehr, the illegal paramilitary groups it sponsored in contravention of the Versailles Treaty. The Reichswehr saw itself as a cadre army that would preserve the expertise of the old imperial military and form the basis for German rearmament. Structure of the Reichswehr Arms limitations under the Treaty of Versailles In Part V of the 1919 Versailles Peace Treaty, Germany had obligated itself to limit the size and armaments of its military forces so that they could be used only as border protection and for the maintenance of order within Germany. In accordance with the treaty’s provisions, personnel strength was limited to a professional army of 100,000 men plus a 15,000-man navy. The establishment of a general staff was prohibited. Heavy weapons above defined calibers, armored vehicles, submarines and large warships were prohibited, as was any type of air force. The regulations were overseen by the Military Inter-Allied Commission of Control until 1927. Conscription into the German army had traditionally been for a period of 1 to 3 years. After they had completed their terms of service, the discharged soldiers created a large pool of trained reserves. The Versailles Treaty fixed the term of service for Reichswehr officers at 25 years and for all others at 12 in order to prevent such a buildup of reservists. Artillerie Regiment Nr 5  The regiment was formed on January 1, 1921 in Ulm from the Reichswehr Artillery Regiments 11, 13 and 14 of the Transitional Army. At the beginning of the 1920s, the departments in Ulm and Fulda exchanged their numbering. In the course of the expansion of the Reichswehr in 1934, the new regiments Artillery Regiment Ulm, Artillery Regiment Fulda and Artillery Regiment Ludwigsburg , each with five departments, were set up from the three departments of the regiment. On October 15, the Artillery Regiment Ulm was renamed Artillery Regiment 5 and placed under the 5th Infantry Division.    

Hellmuth Reymann (24 November 1892 – 8 December 1988) was an officer in the German Army (Heer) during World War II. He was one of the last commanders of the Berlin Defence Area during the final assault by Soviet forces on Berlin. World War II From 1 October 1942 to 1 October 1943, Reymann commanded the 212th Infantry Division as part of Army Group North. From 1 October 1943 to 1 April 1944, he commanded the 13th Air Force Field Division. Reymann’s division suffered heavy losses in the retreat from Leningrad and was disbanded in April 1944. From 1 April 1944 to 18 November 1944, Reymann commanded the 11th Infantry Division. In October 1944, Reymann’s division was encircled in the Courland Pocket and he was replaced by General Gerhard Feyerabend. Berlin, 1945 In March 1945, Reymann was appointed commander of the Berlin Defence Area and replaced General Bruno Ritter von Hauenschild. When he entered Berlin, Reymann found that he had inherited almost nothing from von Hauenschild. Reymann realised that Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels had ruled that any defeatist talk would lead to immediate execution. No plans were drawn up to evacuate the civilian population, which remained in the city.[1] By 21 April, Goebbels, as Reich Commissioner for Berlin, ordered that “no man capable of bearing arms may leave Berlin”. Only Reymann, as commander of the Berlin Defence Area, could issue an exemption. Senior Nazi Party officials, who readily condemned members of the army for retreating, rushed to Reymann’s headquarters for the necessary authorisations to leave. Reymann was happy to sign over 2,000 passes to get rid of the “armchair warriors”. Reymann’s chief-of-staff, Hans Refior, commented, “The rats are leaving the sinking ship”.[2] Both Wilhelm Burgdorf and Goebbels convinced Hitler that Reymann should be relieved of command. When Reymann chose not to locate his office next to Goebbels’s office in the Zoo Tower, Goebbels held that act against him.[3] On 22 April, Hitler relieved Reymann of his command for his defeatism and replaced him with the newly-promoted Generalleutnant Ernst Kaether, who was the former Chief-of-Staff to the chief political commissar of the German Army (Heer). However, Kaether never took command and his orders were cancelled the next day. The result was that when the first Soviet Army units entered the suburbs of Berlin, there was no German commander to coordinate the city’s defences.[3] One day later, Hitler changed his mind again and made Artillery General (General der Artillerie) Helmuth Weidling the new commander of the Berlin Defence Area.[4] Weidling remained in command of Berlin’s defenses to the end and ultimately surrendered the city on 2 May to Soviet General Vasily Chuikov.[5] Army Group Spree After his dismissal as the commander of the Berlin Defence Area, Reymann was given a weak division near Potsdam. The division received a dubious designation “Army Group Spree”.[3] Reymann’s unit could not then link up with General Walther Wenck’s unit, just south of Potsdam, because of the strong Soviet Red Army forces.[6] On 28/29 April, Wenck’s 12th Army held the area around Beelitz long enough for about 20,000 of Reymann’s men to escape through the narrow route to the Elbe. Comments  This is an extremely rare photo and will be featured in a book on Berlin 1945. Please note that this photograph shows Reymann likely in 1945, and could even have been taken just before or during the battle of Berlin.