Hi everybody, I came across a german panzer beret, but do not know if its genuine. I bought it from a older man who collected for a long time (since the war), but frequented gun shows to enchance his collection. The liner is torn out completely but there is underneath a hard white plastic/hard rubber material as a shell that has 6 approximatedly black rubber donutt washers that line the vent holes underneath where the liner used to cover or fit around, can still see small remanants of brown dried leather or cork??? The black beret fits over the hard shell and another cushion type band (grey felt) goes around the whole helmet with the beret fitting over that then being tucked neatly in by soft black rubber foam material trim that also goes completely around the helmet. The insignia is made of aluminum that is a eagle on the top of a swastika, and a wreath around the red dot insiginia. I've seen other panzer helmets but they have cloth insiginia, is this correct to be a metal (aluminum) insignia? Does this have any signs of being original? Thanks Okha
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Hi Okha, sorry, but from your description the beret and crash liner do not sound original. I would say that the liner is the post war West German Panzer crash liner. Originals do not feature any plastic type materials. (I always wondered why they bothered making these Post war given the unpopularity of the originals?)
I have never seen any metal insignia other, than just a cockade on an original beret, and this was on a first issue beret, without the eagle, in a 1934/35 photo. The wreath was embroidered in silver bullion.
Hope this answers your question?
Cheers, Ade.
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