Marine Brigade Ehrhardt
에르하르트 해병여단
A Freikorps raised in Wilhelmshaven on 17 February 1919 from former Imperial Navy officers and petty officers under Lieutenant Commander Hermann Ehrhardt. It was used to crush the Bavarian Soviet Republic and on the eastern frontier in Upper Silesia, and in March 1920 occupied Berlin as the main force of the Kapp Putsch.
In depth
Formed as the “2nd Marine Brigade” by officers who had put down the Communist rising in Wilhelmshaven in January 1919, it overthrew the council governments of Brunswick and Munich. It became known for the swastika painted on its helmets and its song beginning “Swastika on the helmet”. The order to disband it under the Versailles treaty was the direct trigger of the Kapp Putsch, and after the putsch failed it was dissolved in May 1920. Some of its men joined the Reichswehr, while others followed Ehrhardt into the assassination group Organisation Consul.