nice spade cover

[corporalSteiner]

hi gents
this spade cover with eagle seems bunde early post war...any ideas on it would be welcome!

http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...d.php?t=404533

[Guardian 5]

corporalSteiner - An intriguing piece. We had some interesting discussions on post war e-tool carriers on the various BGS field gear threads. This could be one of them; I'd like to hear what Gordon, Klaus1989 and sgtmunroe would have to say.

Another theory would be Austrian. Can you see an "HBA" under the eagle? This would indicate an item of issue to the Austrian Bundesheer.

Hopefully, we'll get some help soon.

All the best - TJ

[Asbjoern]

This type of eagle is not so often seen on such kind of Material, but it is clearly a BRD eagle!

Jens

[Klaus1989]

Looks like straight shovel cover to me, typical postwar construction with the rivets. The rivets are in different places slightly from ones in photos, but they are uncommon and no idea how many variations exist. The eagle is most for Bundeswehr items, normally I see it on fork/spoon set but not often on field equipment.

Here is photo in use by BGS (ca. late 1950s), one of clearest photos to see of covers. Note rivets are similar placed, but not identical to yours:



regards
Klaus

[Guardian 5]

Jens and Klaus - Thanks for your input.

All the best - TJ

[corporalSteiner]

highly impressed and appreciative of guts and effort involved in helping to understand this piece. a fine friendly corner to a great forum. thanks a lot, gents! (no hba spotted, tj).

[Gordon Craig]

corporalSteiner,

Welcome to the site. I can not add anything to what has already been said. Thanks for the kind words. Please visit anytime you think we might be able to help.

Regards,

Gordon

[Guardian 5]

corporalSteiner - Having reached a consensus, I think congratulations are in order for a superb find.

Early (c.1951 - 1962) BGS spade covers such as yours are few and far between. Standard issue Wehrmacht spade covers are much easier to find and identify.

We'll keep your photos on hand as references in an effort to build a data base on these extremely uncommon pieces of field gear.

Thanks to all who made the identification possible and again, my compliments to corporalSteiner on obtaining a great piece of Cold War history.

All the best - TJ

[Klaus1989]

TJ,
I think it is probably more ca. 1955-59 Bundeswehr cover than BGS one because I almost never this Bundesadler stamp on BGS items (except firearms) but it appear occasionally on Bw items. I would guess their covers were identical otherwise. Photo of BGS to show rivet placement on West German covers. Although not exact match, it probably is variation (different maker, etc).

regards
Klaus

[Asbjoern]

Klaus, you may be right with the eagle...but I´ve never heared of rigid spades with leather carrier procured by the BW! There are at least 4 early versions of folding spades between 1955 and 1959 - all with canvas carriers. The only leather carrier was invented after 1960 for the Ideal spade ...The only spades of this type where those taken over from the BGS .

Jens

[Klaus1989]

I know I saw photos of Bw with straight shovel. Found a photo from 1956, was posted awhile ago by TJ (hope he does not mind repost). The soldier in center has black leather carrier, others have long shovels, but harder to see. Of course they could borrow BGS equipment at time though.

I have seen the canvas folding shovel covers (always without shovel) on ebay often, but not know much about early Bw spades.



regards
Klaus

[Forseti]

We allways forget:

German history is not only WW2, nazi-era, postwarera...

There had been a time between WW1 and WW2: The Weimarer Republik. And they used the same eagle (on documents as well as on Abnahmestempel ) as the later BRD used the Bundesadler. Its the same eagle. You will find them also on Weapons Kar 98k - when produces BEFORE the eagle with swastika was in use.

So maybe this is a cover from Weimarer Republik (Reichswehr).?

[Collectinsteve]

Hi Klaus,

Great picture!! Interestingly in another thread there is a picture of a Bundeswehr soldier clearly wearing BGS leather Y-straps and another picture of an officer wearing what appears to be Austrian Y-straps. So I think in these early years there was use of non-standard equipment because either there was no standard yet or production was not fast enough to equip everybody.

Steve