![]() ![]() Army first authorized issuing an ID Tag during WWI, around December of 1906. The British Army were issuing tags of fibre from the start of WWI, a style used by their forces in Canada and New Zealand through WWII and the Korean War. As the use of such ID systems spread to other military’s, the nickname went with them. The Army issued tags were soon nicknamed Hundermarken (the German equivalent of “dog tags”) because of the comparison to a similar identification system used for dogs in Berlin at about the same time. The Prussian Army seems to be the first to use military issued tags, during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, and this is where the nickname of Dog Tag also seems to come from. Manufacturers of ID products capitalized on this and soon developed various products that could be purchased and used by soldiers. The idea of being able to be identified after falling in battle has it’s modern beginnings with the American Civil War where soldiers used a variety of methods, from pinning notes with their names and addresses to the backs of their coats to etching that information in to the back of their issued belt buckles. These ID tags come to signify something very personal for the soldier, and unfortunately all too often for the family a soldier may leave behind. The set of Dog Tags has become a ubiquitous symbol associated with military service, the metal tags, hanging from chains around a soldier’s neck – or often hung as part of a make-shift memorial. ![]()
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