World War I German Field Telephone

Feldsendersprecher-battery box

I was looking out for a WWI field telephone when I visited the Somme last year but the best I could do was this German Telephone battery box which I bought at the museum at Albert. The museum sells artifacts but these are getting scarcer and of poorer quality each year.

The inside lip of the lid is inscribed "F.Mauthe Gmbh, Schalmingen" or something like this. If anyone can verify this wording or has any information I would be interested to hear it.

Here are some views:-

On the top of the lid there were a couple of labels helping with its operation. The terminals connected to the telephone lines laid between trenches

and the loudspeaker presumably for morse reception connected to the complicated array of sockets on the end. A second wooden box with the rest for the handset connects to this one.

See pictures of complete equipment