Wehrmacht night fighting equipment

[Stephen White]

I recall somewhere in the Panther threads a discussion about whether the Wehrmacht used Infra Red night fighting sights at the end of the War. In 2015 Laurent Rosset made one of the Mike Stannard kits on his Smallturm:

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Thread here:

http://www.armortek.co.uk/Forum3b/viewt ... 3f49a524ce

Earlier, in 2011, Simon Manning built this extraordinary, working example for his Panther:

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Wehrmacht IR always seems to be thought of as a "What if" concept, one which was being developed at the end of the War but never fielded in combat. Well, I've just being doing some research in the UK National Archives for my Comet, which was involved in an engagement in April 1945 during which, 3rd Royal Tank Regiment knocked out the last remaining Tiger of Kampfgruppe Schulze. This KG was formed by the staff of the Tank Training School at Bergen and thrown into action with a motly collection of Tigers (Kampfgruppe Fehrmann) and Panthers. In the 3RTR War Diary, I came across this reference to 'Secret Equipment":

I was intrigued by what the "Secret Equipment" might be and started researching the Wehrmacht officer named, Major Thilo Graf von Werthern, who was a Knight's Cross Holder. At the time of his capture, he was commanding the Nachtkampfabteilung of the Panzertruppenschule at Bergen. Clearly, he was captured with some of his night fighting equipment, which was of great interest to the Allies, as it was far more sophisticated than anything they had.

I then found this reference to von Werthern:

http://f15919.nexusboard.de/t1171f7-Pz- ... htung.html

"Note: Among the tanks from Putlos should have been two tanks V "Panther" with built-in night vision devices. (There are no documented testimonies to this assumption, nor are there any references in the American documents to finding such technology in the booty vehicles.The most important indicator is the course of the night battles in Stadensen and at the bridge near Fallersleben.)
At the beginning of April, Colonel Grosan had handed over the last parts of the night fighting department from Fallingbostel to Putlos. Actually, the "Panther" tanks with the BIWA night vision devices should not be used. They should not fall into the hands of the enemy. A part of this night combat department under Major von Werther was set in motion to Berlin, but then turned off to the northwest and fell into the hands of the British at Bad Segeberg.
With the mounted on the tanks BIWA night vision devices, the tank could be driven in complete darkness and it was a safe warfare up to a distance of 400 m possible. A headlight vehicle (eagle owl) was required for the warfare over 1 000 m. Such a vehicle was assigned 4 to 6 tanks with night vision device."

So von Werthern was captured by 3RTR with his IR kit. There is still no evidence that any IR kit was used in combat on a tank but the tanks which equipped KG Schulze had, contrary to the report above, been moved from Putlos to Fallingbostel before being taken into action. Amongst them were the group of Panthers. It raises the intriguing possibility that one or two of those tanks could have been equipped with operational night vision kit. At any rate, this does establish where and when the Allies first got their hands on it.

Which is why I enjoy research.

Stephen

[simon_manning]

Good subject Stephen, for more enlightenment if that's the word, go to the German website "Panther 1944" this discussion, Rabbit hole, was well covered to the point where the moderator Eddie erble threatened a ban off the site if anybody mentioned this subject without any solid proof, low and behold some evidence did surface of panther's being equipped and sent out, my memory might be suspect here because it was around 2011, the vehicles were unloaded at sealow heights, poland i think, a spelling like that, they were unable to use the I.R. due to snow flake interference and the rapid onslaught of the russians, Eddie Erble and his forum members found in germany an old panther crew member with some recollection's of the i.r. device, The guy the British caught with the i.r. system had it fixed to his car, driving at night with the device fastened on to the bonnet trying to escape, when they caught him they were obviously as curios to what it was,
well it was all something like that, i read it all during my construction of the I.R. SYSTEM., Regards simon.