The 4th SS "Nederland" Volunteer Mechanized Infantry Brigade formed in October 1943 from the former Legion Nederland and new recruits to the Waffen-SS initially assembled for incorporation into the SS Nordland Division, but instead formed into one of the 1943 assault brigades. It consisted of two mechanized infantry regiments, named 48th "General Seyffardt" and 49th "De Ruiter", the 54th Artillery Regiment, as well as engineer and armored reconnaissance battalions and a signal company. Dutch volunteers formed about half of the ranks of the infantry, the rest being ethnic Germans, most from Romania and Hungary. The Brigade fought under the III Germanic SS Corps at Oranienbaum, Narva, the Courland Pocket, and West Prussia, suffering heavy casualties such that few Dutch volunteers may have remained in the Brigade, when it was destroyed outside Berlin in April 1945. In December, 1944, the 54th SS Artillery Regiment was added to the brigade, which was nominally designated the 23rd SS "Nederland" Volunteer Mechanized Infantry Division, but it remained a division solely on paper.
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