The Danish M/44 uniform
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The M/44 uniform was introduced, not as you might think during World War two, but after the war ended. During the war Danish refugees, sailors, exiled freedom fighters, former soldiers and others that lived in Sweden had formed DANFORCE - The Danish Brigade in Sweden. An "exile army" ready to liberate the motherland (Especially Copenhagen). It never came to that, but the "brigadiers" made up the core of the re-formed Danish army in the first year after the liberation together with members of the underground army.
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Danish M/44 uniform - second lieutenant, Danske Livregiment
The brigadiers were equipped and dressed as according to the picture on the left. The uniform was more or less copied from the British battle dress, with a few alterations. The most noticeable difference was the colour. The uniforms were made of the standard Swedish grey wool, used for their own uniforms.
As the war ended, they had to standardise the uniform with all troop units. Some units used British / Australian / Canadian battle dress uniforms, and some units used the Swedish copy. In the end the Danish army "came up" with the M/44. An altered version of the Brigadier uniform. It now looked more like the "real" British battledress uniforms. In the beginning they were made with brass buttons, but in the late 1950s they changed to plastic buttons. It was slowly replaced by the M/58 uniform in the early 1960s, although the home guard continued to use it for a little longer. The regimental brass badges were authorized in 1949. My particular uniform has never been used, and may have been a "spare" for the 2nd lieutenant it belonged to, or may simply have been in storage for its entire life. The brass collar insignia is the regimental insignia of the "Danske Livregiment". It was the oldest Danish regiment, formed on the 7th of December 1763 and was disbanded and merged with the Guard Hussar regiment in 2000 on the 31th of December. |
