Early GJ uniforms

[Gordon Craig]

Gentlemen,

The thread that Lars started on a GJ Anorak started me thinking about starting a thread on the first GJ uniforms and anoraks issued to the Heer. I have one early skibluse but only pictures from a book called "Bergkameraden in Uniform". I don't usally post pictures from books but this rare book, publish in 1961, is a treasure trove of info on early GJ uniforms. I have published some pictures from it previously of very unusual winter cammo in wear and there are anoraks etc in these pictures that I have never seen in real life. The most commonly worn anorak in the book is very similar to that worn by the GJ in WWII so I will show pictures of a WWII GJ Anorak from my collection for comparison purposes.
I'll start with the BW GJ anorak.

[Gordon Craig]

Like the WWII anoraks, the early BW ones were two sided. Brown on ones side and white on the other.

[Gordon Craig]

Now for the comparison to the WWII anorak. The WWII type has three pockets across the front on both sides. The BW anorak seems to have two pockets lower down. One on each side but the pictures aren't clear enough to confirm this. The WWII anorak was isued with matching pants but that does not appear to be the case with the BW anorak.

[Gordon Craig]

The one piece of early of BW GJ kit that I have is a skibluse. It is dated later on but appears to have been worn from the very beginning. I have a picture somewhere showing the skibluse and the anorak clearly being worn at the same time but I could not find it this morning.
Note the similarities between the WWII anorak and the skibluse in the "tail" that was worn between the leg, similar to the FJ smocks, and the straps to tighten the ends of the sleeve.

[Gordon Craig]

BW anorak sleeve compared to the WWII sleeve.

[Gordon Craig]

The label on the BW skibluse and the "tail".
The name for this anorak as a "skibluse" comes from Hormann's book page 84.

[Gordon Craig]

I believe that the officers in these pictures are wearing the skibluse tucked into their pants. These pictures give you a good view of the skibluse in wear.

[Gordon Craig]

The next fotos show a parka that I have only seen in this book. It also white on one side and brown on the other with fur trim around the hood.

[Gordon Craig]

Another picture of the parka with the fur trimmed hood and a picture of the parka in wear that I mentioned in Lars thread. This parka appears on page 128 of Schusters book.

Regards,

Gordon

[allen]

Great thread, I've never seen this stuff before. In reference to the pic with the three guys wearing ties, what is different about that parka from the normal BW parka? Other than the one on the right having a quilted liner, they look the same to me.

[Asbjoern]

Allen, I don`t think that the guys on the last picture are wearing a special GJ parka, to me these jackets look like the standart Feldparka issued from 1959 onwards.

Jens

P.S. : For sure the "Bergkameraden" book should be the number 1 on every GJ collectors wish list ... but the Andernach book also has a lot of early GJ stuff to offer, for example GJ on a high mountain patrol wearing their Affenjacken...

[Gordon Craig]

allen,

Allen,

I've never seen one of these early parkas but from pictures the differences between the ones pictured in this thread and later ones appear to be;
1 - Shape of the pocket flaps;
2 - lining in later coats is removable. These early ones (first type issued) appear to have a quilted attached lining. There are two types of removable linings in later coats;
3 - no buttons across the front.
According to Kunstwadl in his book he indicates these parkas were the first ones issued to the BW.

Regards,

Gordon

[allen]

Early BW parka

The earliest BW parka I've seen was on ebay a while back, it had hand warming pockets and that was the only difference I noticed, other than the lack of the little flags. It looked like the old US Army "Overcoat, Parka Type" worn in Korea. I guess that's the garment on which it was based.