Officially sealed pattern on Weitzes site

[Robert]

I just saw an item on Weitzes site that cought my attention. Its a sealed pattern, dated 1905 by the war ministry. Are there any references about such patterns? Was it a common practice to provide them to helmet makers?

https://www.weitze.net/detail/59/Pr...Helmadler_fuer_die_Pickelhaube__102359_e.html

 

[joerookery]

Are there any references about such patterns? Was it a common practice to provide them to helmet makers?

Robert,

I think this is a wonderful subject that is not well documented. I have put part of what I have learned into my original article on Depot marks. This is a really confusing question and confusing issue that I think is worthy of much discussion. I know that Karel has several probe helmets. Many of the good reference books have pictures of Probe tags on very as pieces of equipment and uniforms. yes it was common practice to provide samples to the helmet makers and those samples called Probe had to be approved by the war Minister. So you had four different kinds of Probe, depending upon the war Ministry. There were also quasi-war ministries in Mecklenburg-Strelitz and Hesse Darmstadt.

Directives for uniforms, clothing and equipment started with the Prussian War Ministry. Constitutionally, they were empowered to direct the other war ministers. Major changes required an endorsement by the Kaiser (major changes) or the "Kriegsminister" (minor changes). Those changes were published as an "Allerhöchste Kabinettsorder" (A.K.O.) (supreme cabinet order) in the "Armee-Verordnungsblatt" (AVB) issued by the Prussian War Ministry. The AVB are full of those uniform changes in detail. The other three kingdoms took theAKOs found in the AVBs and published them as "Allerhöchste Entschließung" (A.E.), "Allerhöchste Order" (A.O.) or "Allerhöchster Befehl" (A.B.) in their respective local AVB "Verordnungsblättern". Therefore, adoption of AKOs took place at different times and to different degrees.

All uniform pieces were specified in detail in the "Bekleidungsordnungen" (Bkl.O.) for NCOs and ORs or in the Offizier Bekleidungs-Vorschriften (O.Bkl.V.) for officers.The officer regulation is translated into English in Appendix A. of Randy Trawnik’s book. http://www.pickelhauben.net/books/trawnik.htm

I will finish after lunch.....

 

[joerookery]

So far so good, no big surprises. But as you start drilling down you start asking questions. The issues are more of a historical and process nature but are germane to collectors in variations of helmets by maker, and perhaps of unit.

Then the Prussian war ministry issued samples of the uniform or equipment to the army corps. Each corps had a small but very important supply unit called the Bekleidungsamt (BKA or BA). The samples were called Probe and the army corps BKA received them and called for bids from the suppliers of their army corps district. The bids were designed to produce the respective piece of uniform or equipment according to the specifications given by the samples. The Bekleidungsämt had to accept the bids of at least two suppliers per article to avoid monopolies and the image of corruption. It seems however, that 4 of the 25 Corps did not at first glance have an independent BKA. The last army corps to be added XVIII, XX, XXI and III Bavarian Corps seemed to have doubled on an older BKA. We still had 21 BKA.

So the War Minister issued Probe samples to several corps. If you use the example that you showed here it probably didn't need to be sent to the BKA at XII, XIX, XIII, or the two other Bavarian Corps. Therefore, if you subtract five from that 21 there are 16 Probe examples that had to be sent out from the Prussian War Ministry. The questions lead you to both upstream and downstream subcontracting issues. Who made the original Probe examples for the War Minister? How were those specifications, transmitted? I have been pursuing this question with a series of people from Heerskunde without satisfaction. It is even more interesting to me on the downstream side. Now that the army corps district has a Probe example now what? The key point seems to be how were the helmets purchased and to what standard by the army corps? Then there is entire world of Nachprobe. If there is interest I can continue, as I have chased this down to suppliers through budgeting and catalogs. I am not near the end of my search yet but sometimes I get too involved in the details!

 

[Gustaf]

Joe,
Were these probes used as patterns or were they examples that were sent to the officials to get approval for a contract, i.e. an example that was produced by the contractor before they were awarded the contract?
It does not seem to me to be as important to have a sealed example given to a contractor to copy as it would be to have a sealed example of the production that is approved, and this sealed example should be kept to compare to the subsequent production to make sure that the dies are not getting worn, or the contractor is not cutting corners.
Gus

 

[joerookery]

Fair question, I just don't know the exact answer. I actually think it is both. I have seen examples of these tags sent to a specific manufacturer. They were Bavarian. Mostly I think it is the latter and you had different levels of compliance. If you start thinking that there are 16 separate contracts and 16 separate quality inspectors paying 16 different prices. It becomes very difficult to follow. This is compounded by apparently there were some items that were purchased and inspected by one specific BKA for the entire army instead of 16. All of the problems with quality control inspection and different subcontractors seem to have been unchanged from those times until present. But it is murky down there. As a subcontractor you could suggest quality improvements which opened the entire door of Nachproben. This system actually seems like it was adopted at the city level for food!!! So much more research to do, but I just scored a major coup in receiving the 1866 General Staff report. If only Janet would finish chapter 4 and appendix D.....

 

[Robert]

Thats a lot of info, and an interesting subject. The fact that it is sealed would indicate to me that was used to judicially enforce contracts. Maybe the BAs determined approval or rejection of incoming deliveries with it in controversal cases. Gustaf is right that a producer would probably not require a sealed piece.

BTW a side note - the seal tells that the probe "shows the location of the badge for higher beamte", i.e., it is NOT a probe for the helmet plate as a whole.

 

[joerookery]

the seal tells that the probe "shows the location of the badge for higher beamte"

Thank you I did not catch that! So then there must have been another Probe for the wappen. I think there were a lot more of these than I originally thought. Somehow, originally I was under the impression that there were very few and it was for completed end items. This is obviously the wrong impression. There seem to have been many of them, and some component parts had their own Probe. This leads to a whole other line of questioning-if a private purchase company sold helmets were they also helmet assemblers?? Where is Adam Smith and the pin factory......???????

 

[J.LeBrasseur]

The way he has them priced, you would think there are not many!

 

[joerookery]

The way he has them priced, you would think there are not many!

I don't think there are that many and they have sort of this official stamp of approval. I think as a collectors item you cannot get much better than this. This is the approved model. But I do not think that standardization was universal. There are approved models, but nothing I have found that lists tolerances. There is one train of thought that says all contracted and purchased examples should follow the Probe exactly. This idea is brought to the extreme sometimes. The other train of thought says that the Probe was the model to be tried for. We recently played around with Probe requirements and Uberzug numbers. Fascinating topic! From a collection point of view. I would just like to have some of the Probe stuff Karel has....

 

[Robert]

The patern is identified by a number indicating that the ministry kept records of the paterns that were handed out. I think the first word apears to be "Seite" meaning page, followed by 45 before the "No. 532". The references kept by the ministery would be really nice to have.

I would think though too that there were not too many sealed patterns, otherwise a more standardized label would have been used instead of retyping the text each time.

 

[joerookery]

Can anyone make out what it says just above that? you have to wonder if it is page 45. What year was page number one started it? 1905?

 

[joerookery]

These are pictures from the one volume Krauss book "The German Army" page 28. That book is absolutely chockablock full of items with these tags. The photography is a very good and is well worth purchasing. okay Robert, can you make out any of these?

 

[Robert]

> Can anyone make out what it says just above that?

I think that is "Kr. M. Bkl. Abt Abschnitt II"
= Kriegs-Ministerium Bekleidungs-Abteilung Abschnitt II
= War ministry clothing department section two

I do not understand the term "page" in this context either. My only guess is that it refers to a reference book in which the produced patterns were written down. Several of the tags in the pictures have a number like "S. 298" or "S. 325 ff" which evidently refer to page numbers too.

> okay Robert, can you make out any of these?

In the first picture, the tag on the far right attached to the red shoulder board shows a patern for "Büchsenmacher und Zeughausbüchsenmacher", i.e. gun smiths.

In the second picture I can read the right tag:
Probe der Schulterklappe zum dunkelblauen Waffenrock für die Fliegertruppe. (K.M.... Nr. 11447 ... 7.7.14 Nr. 16130)
= Pattern of the shoulder board for the dark blue dress coat of the aeral personnel.. dated July 7th 1914

In the third picture, tag in the middle:
Probe des Taillenknopfes von Tombak für die Felduniform dere berittenen Truppen. Mattierung des Unterteils und Rückens des Taillenknopfes ist gestattet.
= Patern of the waist button (?) made of tombak for the mounted troops. Matting the bottom part and back side is allowed.

The other tags are dificult to read and I cannot make out and longer text parts that give much clue.

 

[Adler]

On request a few pictures of a Probe and a Muster tag...
Imo it went this way with the tags:
The Kriegsministerium wrote a description and a price demand to the contractors for products they needed. The contractors made their offers together with a description of the proposed product. When the price was right a Muster (example or first prototype) had to be made for approval.
Once the Muster was approved, the manufacturer made his first (small) delivery (Probe) and the product was then field tested.
After the field test (maybe some alterations might be possible) the Kriegsministerium approved for mass production.

The Muster tag is attached to the ersatz steel pickelhaube by Bing







The probe tag is attached to the ersatz Tschako

 

[joerookery]

Thank you for posting these! :clown: :clown: Karel!

Imo it went this way with the tags:
The Kriegsministerium wrote a description and a price demand to the contractors for products they needed. The contractors made their offers together with a description of the proposed product. When the price was right a Muster (example or first prototype) had to be made for approval.
Once the Muster was approved, the manufacturer made his first (small) delivery (Probe) and the product was then field tested.
After the field test (maybe some alterations might be possible) the Kriegsministerium approved for mass production.

The Muster tag is attached to the ersatz steel pickelhaube by Bing

Well that is pretty clear. This really has me thinking. I had thought that Muster and Probe where the same. What you are saying is that they were sequential and your explanation actually make some great sense. Let me look in the books and see if I can find more Muster tags that are directly tied to a manufacturer like yours is. Actually I do not think it is safe for you to keep that helmet. Just for the sake of safety, you might want to send it to me or Gus. :reindeer: :reindeer:

 

[Gustaf]

Joe,
You are a very thoughtfull person
Gus

 

[Robert]

Wow those are really great pattern examples! Must be ultra-rare, the ultimate Bing helmet so to say.

These definitely show examples for particular orders. The Bing pattern reads that it an example of the tin helmets that are to be delivered by the company Bing Brothers in Nürnberg. The felt pattern even states the quantity

Maybe there were different kinds of patterns - those for particular orders (like these special ersatz productions) and those for the peacetime production that define a general pattern which would be produced identically from all contractors.

 

[joerookery]

This tag is pictured on page 68 of the Kraus book "The German Army". This is a Muster made out to the firm Lembert. This really supports Karel's train of thought. There are many Probe's pictured but few of these and I did find a Prussian one.

This topic seems pretty popular-I have received quite a few e-mails on it as people are avidly reading it. Someone sent me this scan but I do not know where it came from originally. It is a nice Nachprobe tag.

 

[Adler]

Actually I do not think it is safe for you to keep that helmet. Just for the sake of safety, you might want to send it to me or Gus.

Joe,
You are a very thoughtfull person
Gus

Joe & Gus, I really like you guys, but these two (Probe and Muster) really enjoy their stay with their brothers and sisters in my warroom, so it's hard to separate them without hurting them I guess...

After the field test (maybe some alterations might be possible) the Kriegsministerium approved for mass production.

Concerning the Nachprobe: this could be a new example to be approved after making alterations?...

Adler

 

[joerookery]

I'm still going through a bunch of tags in the reference books. These came out of “The German Infantry” Ulrich Herr, Jens Nguyen, Verlag Militaria , Austria , 2008 (English )

The first one provides a fly in the ointment, as it appears to be a sample from a specific supplier and is called Probe not Muster.

Some general observations as I am thinking aloud. There seem to be different kinds of tags.
Tags originating at the War Minister.
Tags coming from specific suppliers.
Tags associated with specific army corps.
A group of tags called Nachprobe which seem to be product improvements, but I cannot tell if they are from the supplier or the Bekleidungsamt.
There seem to be a general feeling that these are "acceptance" samples. I am not sure what that means.
An idea of the flow would be that the specifications are written by the War Minister. Those specifications are then sent to the various army corps. The specifications are then put up for bid, and those firms winning the bids send a sample (Probe or Muster) back to the Army Corp. for acceptance. If accepted by the Army Corps, the sample is sent up to the War Ministry, and sealed. It seems as though the red seal comes from the War Ministry .The War Ministry takes a sample from an army corps, like the Guard Corps and accepts it as the kingdom wide standard, giving it a seal. If this was the flow there would be no need for any upstream subcontracting to create the "original" sample. However this would allow different Army Corps to nominate samples from different suppliers. The Nachprobe would follow the same path, starting at the supplier and being sent up initially to the Army Corps and then to the War Ministry for acceptance I am still looking at tags….. any other ideas are appreciated.