The Recreated 8. /JR459

Chapter One

In the fall of 2001, 8 Kompagnie, Infanterieregiment Nr. 459 (IR459) was born to a group of historical interpreters and reenactors who were seeking more for their Great War reenacting experiences.

The membership decided that we would like to portray a common "late war" front line infantry company that had fought on the Western Front in 1918. (Mainly because this is a rule in the Great War Association (GWA) for new units to petition to join their ranks and because all we really do is "late war" scenarios.) We also decided the regiment that we would choose would be one that had no gimmicks. This is not a big deal but we wanted to do an average frontline regiment and one that had no fancy shoulder straps or any regimental history that made them out to be glorious. The only thing that made this regiment appealing to us was that on 23.3.18 the regiment actually fought in one of the three towns that was called NEUVILLE on the Western Front. Another thing that sparked an interest in us was they were a late war regiment and despite all they had been through they did their duty till the end of the Great War.

We then chose, the 8th Kompagnie of IR459. The men of the 8th Kompagnie were men belonging to the 1918 class (40 %) and of the returned wounded. This meant to us, we could recruit younger men of the 1918 class and some older men of different regiments returning to the fray.

The spring of 2002, we established a provisional command. Officers and NCO's were chosen. We finished the regimental By-laws keeping in mind that we are all friends and did not need a lot of unnecessary rules to govern us. Louis Plack found in Germany and bought our bible - the regimental history book of IR459. Herr Plack started translating the history book and related a lot of fantastic tid-bits on the kompagnie we were portraying. Herr Plack found a list of dead soldats from 8th Kompagnie and the membership decided to adopt the names of the fallen with new recruits. We felt what better way to honor these hero's, then adopt their names and their birthdays and simply remember them.

It was decided that the men coming into the regiment, who took the "initial" plunge with us would be considered "chartered" members and would not need to be placed in any recruit status. Everyone else who joined after the first year they would be placed on recruit status and learn our ways.

We managed to start our off and on semi bi-monthly newsletter, "Der Lipspringer." We then started our unit's dynamic website and even bought the domain name "www.IR459.org" We built the site to be informative to both the new rekrut and the seasoned soldat.

Chapter Two

The spring of 2002 -- 8 Kompagnie, Infanterie - Regiment Nr. 459 came back to life. The Gods of war are still rejoicing! We participated in our first event at Newport News, Virginia and had a great time mowing down the enemies of the Vaterland. In April we participated in the GWA "spring fling" and managed to field 8 men. More than enough men for our the beginning of our probationary status.

We participated in the GWA "open house" event in June and had a great time. although the event was terribly small we had a great time. We camped in the trenches of JR63 and displayed "trench life" to the gawking "tourons."

At the Fall 2002GWA event, we managed to completely outfit three new recruits and doubled the size of the unit from the GWA spring event. Our first unit elections were held and Unteroffizier Max Stiebritz and Gefreiter Jakob Wilkosz were nominated and voted in.

The unit also recognized Dieter Karl Wachleveski and gave him the honorary rank of Gefreiter for bringing out two MG's for nearly every event. We also recognized Louis Plack for his total committment to the unit. Herr Plack makes our unit's shoulder straps and 8 Kompagnie Troddels. He was awarded a boxed medal set of the EKII and the Order of the Hunsatic Cross.

We found a great deal on a small bunker near our sector and we christened it "Hotel Lust" and settled in. We are now making plans to build an addition to our "bombproof." Mainly because from the day we stepped inside we had already outgrown it. We are finally underground again.

Chapter Three

At the GWA spring 2003 event, JR459 successfully met the requirements of the GWA and were voted by the units in the GWA membership and have finally rid ourselves of that horrible "probationary" title. We had another first that day, One of our first recruits Herr Hoffmann completed his requirements for membership and became JR459 first recruit to complete the recruit sponsorship program. Drei Hoch!

The unit as a whole is growing by leaps and bounds. The membership is growing with the help of our dynamic website and our committment to authenticity. We are making plans to start building our new underground bunker.

The GWA "open house" was still small but we managed to field a sizable force to be reckoned with. We were the largest GWA unit on the field that weekend.

The unit participated in our first movie production of the "Men of Company K." This was about a Marine in WW1 and his experiences.

Just before the fall event we once again went underground again...

The saga continues....