Figure 1.--These boys were photographed in 1913. The caption reads, "young crew with standard). They were located in Tsingtau/Kiautschou, China. The photographwas in thepossession of a German military officer stationed in Tsingtau. Perhaps he helped organize the boy, although were are not sure what the group is.

We note German boys wearing what look to be organization uniforms in the late 19th century, perhaps as early as the 1870s. We are not sure what these early groups are. The earliest groups may be band units. We note some 19th images of German boys wearing a variety of uniforms which are clearly not just band groups. We have no idea as to what organization they belong. Many of these images show boys with musical instruments suggest some kind of band groups. The uniforms are quite varied. One example here is a Berlin boy about 1880 with a drum and fancy uniform. Hopefull our German readers will provide us some insights here. Some may belong to village or community bands, but we believe that other kinds of organizations are involved. We have found some images of German boys in uniforms we can not identify. Some of these images we have since identified and developed some information like the gun clubs and fire rescue brigades. Some images we have been unable to identify. The topic of German youth groups is difficult because there were in Germany during the early 20th century a large number of small youth groups, often with informal uniforms. We have some limited information on these groups, but rarely information on their uniforms. These different organizations were closed or asbsorbed into the Hitler Youth by the NAZIs beginning in 1933. Thus the histortu of German youth groups has since been less complicated.

Figure 1: Young Crew

We note an unidetified German youth group in of all places China (figure 1). These boys are located at Tsingtao/Kiautschou. Germany like other European countries had control of a Chinese city. These cities were called treaty port and essentially administered like colonies. The group here ay have been a local unit without any larger organizational afiliation. This photograph was taken in 1913, 1 year before the outbreak of World War I. Japan joined Britain and launched an offensive which seized Tsingtao from a German and Austrian-Hungarian garison.

Figure 2: Wandrvogel

We have no information on this image except that it was German. It looks to us as if it was tken in the 1910s given the clothes thst the children are wearing. It may have been just a group of local youth. We suspect, however, that it may have been Wandervogel group. The Wandvogel was coeducational and was asociated with hikes and other activities in the countryside. There is no way to be sure, but it looks like the Wandervogel to us.