On January 1st of 1921 new uniform regulations were established. When the Reichwehr was established as the new German defense force in the aftermath of the Great War no helmet insignia was authorized.
Whatever the insignia used it is clear that as time went on the helmet was seen more and more as the preferred method of displaying the designation of the wearer unit. Other Freikorps units used their state colors to create a recognizable insignia while others choose a symbol in which to designate their unit. Freikorps Hacketau had one of the more memorable devices of the era, a large death head painted in silver or white paint on the front of the helmet. Member of Freikorps Ehrhardt wearing WWI era Photos taken during the March, 1920 Kapp Putsch show men from Freikorps Ehrhardt wearing large swastikas painted on the front of their helmets. There were a number of different type of insignia used by these men. These forces used hand rendered insignia on their helmets to identify their individual units. Between 19 paramilitary units known as the Freikorps battled communists in the streets of Germany, Latvia and Poland. This helmet was procured from an American WWI veteran’s estate in the 1960sĪfter the fall of the Kaiserreich in 1918 it wasn’t long before German helmets with new insignia were being used. Original M16 helmet with hand rendered MG insignia. Until some long forgotten veteran account or photograph evidence surfaces the use of these insignia in the field will remain unconfirmed. That being said there may well have been some men who painted the machine-gun on their helmets as an act of bravado. German machine gunners undoubted knew what their fate might be should be be taken alive so the idea of advertising their position on their helmet does seem unlikely. The existence of the many recorded veteran accounts of German machine gunners being executed upon capture, does raise a few questions about the use of these insignia. The lack of war time photos showing the use of these helmets have made many question as to whether these helmets are nothing more then post-war vet art. The conventional wisdom is that these helmets were worn by members of machine gun crews. Over the years a few German helmet have been found bearing a hand rendered Machine gun, usually on the wearer’s left. On this M16 helmet An Original but poorly rendersĪside from the Hohenzollern crest there is at least one more type of insignia found on Great War era German helmets. The Hohenzollern crest is clearly visible Documentation is limited on the history of these crests but photographic evidence as well as surviving original helmets do exist confirming their use. This is undoubtedly due individual artist’s varying skill. The crests were hand rendered and surviving examples show a wide variety of sizes and styles. Sometime in 1917 troops from the 1st Foot Guards Regiment and the 1st Guards signal battalion took to wearing a Hohenzollern crest on the left side of their helmet with the company number painted in white, red or in some cases black on the back of the helmet. The use of helmet insignia by the Germans actually starts back in the First Word War. It is without a doubt worth understand by anyone interested in the history of WWII headgear. The use of decals by the German armed forced is a interested and to some degree complex story. In fact the German high command ordered the so called double decal helmet phased out before the invasion of France in 1940. While it is certainly true that the German armed forces did wear helmets with decals on them the use of a double decal helmet was far from predominate. Schultz wearing his iconic double decal Luftwaffe helmet From the comical Sargent Schultz of Hogan’s Hero’s fame to more recent films Hollywood has cemented the double decal helmet as the predominate headgear of the WWII German soldier into the consciousnesses of modern culture. Most people, even those who know little about the history of WWII can easily recognize one of these helmets. There maybe no more iconic item from the Second World War than the double decal German helmet.
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