Thanks still again, Taki. Sometimes the best discussions arise when someone like Arthur has an original artifact, someone like you has the deep knowledge, and others the deep questions. Everyone benefits, including the forum as a whole.
When did Japan first adopt ID tags for her troops?
- Other armies were generally wearing them by the time of World War I. In the US Civil War, a variety of privately-made tags were bought and worn by some individual soldiers. Then by the Spanish-American War, private tags were worn by some entire regiments. Finally, the entire US Army adopted the first standard dog tags for all its soldiers in the 1900s.
Although not sure, I have the impression that armies began to issue dog tags because of the rise of large modern conscript forces, and the overseas colonial wars of the late 19th century. Like the US at the time, Japan had only recently begun to modernize her military and send it overseas in strength for the first time.
Akira Takizawa wrote: 12th Field Artillery Regiment was deployed in Hokkaido. It is curious that this tag was found on Karafuto.
When German soldiers were transferred to from one unit to another, they sometimes continued to wear their original tags for a time. Maybe this was common for Japanese troops, also? Especially later in the war when new units were organized from stragglers, remnants, and survivors.
The Japanese soldier’s blood type was not marked on his ID tag, but this may not have been commonly done by various other armies at least until World War II, by which time blood transfusion had become more routine. The US War Department
Handbook of Japanese Military Forces makes passing mention of older transfusion methods in some use by the IJA. In this forum we have dismissed a
dubious idea that the IJA had theorized grouping its soldiers by their blood type. But in any case was a soldier’s blood type durably marked anywhere on his person, since it was not on his dog tag?
The single round hole in one end of the ID tag from Taki’s photo would show that this one was hung from a cord, rather than a fabric tape threaded through two opposing slots as in other tags.
Compared to IJA soldiers’ ID tags, were there any differences in those of Japanese –-
- -- Navy personnel? The wartime German Navy sailor wore the same design of oval tag as his Army comrade, but his was made of brass not zinc, and had different information on it.
-- Pilots and aircrews, whether Army or Navy? As a comparison, German crewmen of Luftwaffe planes and Army Panzers wore theirs on fine steel twist-chains, instead of the woven cords used by ground troops. This prevented loss of the tags if the wearer’s body was burned in a fire or crash.
-- prewar and wartime soldiers? Although their design is very similar, German Army ID tags of World War I can be told apart from those of World War II by the different information on them. US Army tags of World War I are similar to interwar ones, but might be told apart in a similar way.
The wartime Infantry Journal drawings of ID tags are inaccurate for World War II. But, might they be more like IJA tags from earlier times, from around World War I for example? Sometimes, information that is incorrect was simply outdated, when its reporter did not know any better and thought it was still true.
Akira Takizawa wrote:Because they [the rectangular ones] are not soldier's ID tags. I copied from my reply to an inquiry from Arthur.
Right top
It is not a dog tag. "Pulp" is engraved on it. Probably, it is a name plate of worker in pulp factory.
This would mean a workman in a paper or lumber mill, in the far north?
Did any other Japanese civilians ever have to wear some kind of ID tags in war zones, or in war-related work? Such as:
- merchant sailors under military or naval command
South Manchuria Railroad workers,
Policemen, firemen, air-raid wardens
Red Cross
paramilitary groups like the Seinendan (Youth Corps)
Peter H wrote: Ultimately why these tags were required. This photo wasn't published until 1964. Fallen soldier, I think from Nomonhan in 1939.
This couldn’t be from Nomonhan, which was in summertime? The casualty is wearing winter battledress. Although there had been many earlier, nameless skirmishes with the Soviets along the Manchurian border.
The original wartime source of the photo would have some small interest. If Japanese, was there a policy about casualty photos shown or not shown back home in Japan? If not Japanese it would be either Soviet or Chinese, and could that have any remote connection with the late publication date?
-- Alan
