Low Price Original German Wwii Army Heer Infantry Em/nco Schirmmütze Visor Cap - Missing Sweatband & Broken Chinstrap - Size 55 Slash 55% Off The Price [jeV7WNfG]

Original Item: Only One Available. This is a lovely service example of a German WWII Wehrmacht Heer Army Infantry EM/NCO Schirmmütze (visor cap), which has had the entire sweatband rot out, and also had the leather chinstrap degrade and tear as well. We assume this happened post war due to relatively heavy use during the war. It features the typical feldgrau (field gray) "whipcord" weave wool construction with a dark bottle-green (flaschengrün) "badge cloth" band and a traditional high forward crown. The cap also has matching Weiß (white) piping along the top edge and flanking either side of the band, the Corps Color (Waffenfarbe) for Infanterie (Infantry) and Motorisiert Infanterie (Motorized Infantry). It still has the stiffener ring around the crown to maintain the shape, though it has still sunk a bit, giving it a nice gently sloped look.

It is decorated with a well detailed stamped aluminum eagle insignia on the peak and and an open silvered alloy wreath surrounding a plated metal tri-color cockade on the band. The the eagle still is bright and shiny, while the wreath and cockade show a lovely aged patina, with some oxidation and flaking, giving them a great "been there" look. The red felt insert in the cockade is still relatively vibrant, and does not show any damage. The dual-buckled black leather chinstrap, designating the wearer to be an enlisted man, unfortunately tore off from the left side, and the leather also split and broke close to the right side as well. The leather became brittle over the years, causing this to happen.

The vulcanfibre visor has a smooth black leather-look upper, exhibiting light wear along the edge and is brown on the underside. The top of the visor has a lovely pattern of fine crazing and checking, which only happens after decades. It is how somewhat loosely attached to the body of the cap, due to the stitching degrading. The interior of the cap is lined with light brown / orange service cloth material, and there is a №55 stamp on the inner crown, for a size of 55cm. As mentioned previously, the sweatband is completely missing, though it looks like in the past someone may have used hot glue to try to reattach a portion to the inside of the visor.

Overall condition definitely shows a good amount of wear and also some past moth damage to the outer shell. There are no major holes, but it definitely shows some smaller holes in the more protected areas of the cap.

A very nice salty example of the classic hat worn by German Army Infantry NCOs in WWII, ready to display!

The German Schirmmütze Visor Cap:
The visor cap (Schirmmütze) was an important part of the headgear worn by German uniformed military, civil, paramilitary and political organizations during the Third Reich. This was the standard cloth headgear worn as a part of the service uniform. Visor caps were worn outdoors as well as indoors, and were often required to be worn by all personnel on duty. Visor caps were made in versions specific to each organization and were often further differentiated through the use of insignia, colored piping, or style of chin cord, to indicate rank, role or branch. The insignia used on these caps ranged from simple stamped metal emblems, to elaborate hand embroidery. Visor caps were issued to enlisted soldiers and NCOs in the military and in some other organizations. Officers had to purchase their own hats, and lower ranks could choose to purchase caps that were of a higher quality than the rather basic, issue examples. The private purchase caps were generally made in very high quality, with fine materials. A wide variety of fabrics were used, from Trikot and doeskin, to heavy wool, or even lightweight white fabric for summer wear. In the military, issue of these caps was generally suspended shortly after the outbreak of the war, but they continued to be worn by some troops until the end of the war.