Welcome to the forum Helmmitspitze....First, I want to have this helmet sitting on my collector shelf
a very, very nice example. :thumb up: As far as the kokarde is concerned perhaps it is just an example of a private purchase by an officer, interestingly it is mounted on the left, rather than the right side as the Prussian helmets. I have a Mecklenburg dragoon helmet of the same era (I believe the 1868 pattern) with a similar cloth kokarde, perhaps of woven silk, it is mounted on the right hand side. For the liner, again, just an officers choice, I looked through the collection and found a Prussian 1860 officer with a similar leather band (although the cloth is now missing), an 1867 Prussian officer with a black leather band but with red cloth and an 1860 Landwehr officers Tschako with black silk. As a contrast my 1857 Prussian officer helmet has a more standard, or usually encountered style with the individual leather extensions.
I wonder though if this cloth style kokarde didn't serve as the inspiration for the unique Saxon pattern kokarde later produced in metal? Did you look inside for a name?
I do have a period CDV image of a Saxon soldier wearing this pattern helmet which I will try and post here over the weekend.
Cheers
Larmo
Here is the image of the Saxon soldier I mentioned, my apologies for the poor condition quality, as the cdv is a bit battered a bit from age, but at present he is my only Saxon soldier wearing a pickelhaube from the 1870-1871 War era.
I also included two photos of kokarden, the Saxon one is from an 1867 Garde Reiter helmet (1878 date in the neckguard) and the Mecklenburg example from a Dragoon helmet for comparison.
