Hauben Painted Feld Grau

b.loree

b.loree

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I was reading the book Intimate Voices From the First World War ISBN 0-6-058420-3 last night. This contains diary entries from soldiers and civilians of all sides during the war. Of particular interst to us haube collectors, is a passage from the diary of Piete Kuhr a 12 year old girl living in the East Prussian town of Schneidemuhl. Her diary entry for May 20th 1915 (pg62):
"Now when the trains come from the west with soldiers being transfered to the Eastern Front, their uniforms are dirty and torn. Their spiked helmets are no longer enameled black, but are painted field grey." So, this contemporay source seems to prove that a painted feld grau leather haube is legitimate. Does anyone have such a helme in their collections or at least has seen one?? There was a link posted last week of a converted fire helmet painted this way. Thoughts??
 
Maybe little Piete mistook the Field Cover/Überzug for gray paint or by 'painted' simply meant 'colored' feldgrau?
 
Could be Ronny. The kid was sharp though...obviously I can not post all her diary entries but from what I have read I doubt she would have made a mistake between cloth and paint. This is a translation so perhaps there was a problem with that?? I recommend this book to all, as there are excerpts from many nationalities including an African soldier who fought for the French.
 
b.loree said:
So, this contemporay source seems to prove that a painted feld grau leather haube is legitimate.
Click to expand...

This is very interesting, I gotta say. To have a first hand description of that is very very cool. The thing is, from a collectors point of view, thats gotta be one hard decision to make when deciding if the paint is "new" or "old". How can you tell if its authentic? Uniform related pieces during WW1 get really confusing and that grey area really gets big. I myself would not be able to really decide if the paint was recently done or if it is a hundred years ago. There are really really good fakes out there and that is the problem. Unless the helmet was in the family and documented as being so I would be skeptical. Its like those really well done fake kokardes, its easy to slop some paint on it, take a picture of it somewhat out of focus and make $100.
 
Does anyone have such a helme in their collections or at least has seen one??
Click to expand...
I know, it's not a leather haube, but a metal one... but I think this shows an example of a helmet that once was black and was repainted afterwards. The repainting isn't done by a brush but appears to be sprayed...
Hope this helps you...

Adler

PS Sorry for the bad quality of the (old) picture...

 
Nice helmet! The one at Weitz, I looked at as well. Being a converted helmet of some sort, it's pretty interesting.

:D Ron
 
The Weitz helme is a converted fire man helme due to the visor trim on the rear peak. So many scenarios that we collectors can make from this kids diary entry.
 
This is the only pictures I am aware of that has a painted helmet. Albeit a shako. Very very early in the war.


ps1592 by joerookery, on Flickr

1914_Russland_tschako.jpg
 
Nice photos Joe! Brian, that was my thought as well, but I didn't want to say 'fireman' because beamte such as customs officials had the same... so that was my line of thought.

Seeing the painted helmets reminds me of when we arrived in Iraq, many of us removed the digital helmet covers and painted our helmets desert tan, some with patterns some without, then put the covers over them. Many times, the covers were removed for missions (since the gray of the cover wasn't seen as very useful), but most left the covers on and had the camo underneath just in case. I only went on one mission, but do have the painted helmet under my cover... not that it was necessarily a 'combat' thing, more of a 'we found some paint!' activity. I'm sure these German troops did it for a very practical reason indeed.

:D Ron
 
I have one identical to Adlers', and have seen several others like it over the years. All "next generation" kit helmets, and all painted field grey.

If I recall correctly, someone posted one exactly like it that had been excavated from an old eastern front trench line. Same off-brand screw holding on the wappen and all.
 
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