Tropical Engineers Overseas Cap

[Tim O'Keefe]

Magnification of the circumference stitch going through a soutache must be a key in all of this. Is it consistent all the way round the cap ?

An extra thread of a slightly different shade of olive may not be a good sign. Especially if that slightly different thread was only at the front of the cap going through the soutache when the other thread present did not.

When I get a chance and some of the other deadlines in life ease back a bit, I will get some of my caps out and post images of these points under discussion,

Chris

Agree Chris,
In some of the HB 842's-1142's etc that were altered, the original stitchline around the caps circumference has been removed (just around the soutache area) and replaced with another thread over the (post war added) soutache. There are examples of caps where the holes of the original stitchline were used in the added post war stitchline. But in some cases you can still see the holes from the original stitchline and a "new" stitchline as well....

[Tim O'Keefe]

Hello Mark,

thank you for the kind words and posting your cap to add to the mix.

I have not seen that type of soutache application before on a CW trop. sidecap. However, I think you might have one from a "rework" bundle (see post numbers 67 to 76) so it might not have been done by CW themselves ???

The reason I suspect that yours is a period rework, is the double size marking and the "F" cross out over one of the sizes. For some reason these reworks were double checked like factory seconds, re-measured and size marked again correctly. Any other improvements or alterations also appear to have been caried out at that time.

There were definitely some bundles of "reworked caps" in the "Beehive find. The question is who reworked the caps, when, where or at what level in the manufacture/ distribution/ unit use ???

Chris

p.s. The machine application that Tim is showing in post number 101 is what I am use to seeing on all CW trop. sidecap with factory applied soutache that I have checked. However, if you look at my CW reworked cap with black soutache in post numbers 75 & 76. It is interesting that my example has a hand applied soutache which is not typical of any of the makers and your cap has an un-typical machined application of the soutache. Both caps double sized, both caps with an "F" cross out to one of the size markings.

I still think the "rework" would have been done at the CW factory, via QC, quality control etc ? Can anyone add to the "reworked bundles"?

[90th Light]

The "F" may be falsch for wrong.

New information,

it could mean "Feldbrauchbar" ... suitable for field use after repair/ alteration,

Chris

[Diane]

There are a couple of these overseas caps at www.brandenburghistorica.com for comparison.

Diane

[90th Light]

There are a couple of these overseas caps at www.brandenburghistorica.com for comparison.

Diane

Sadly those two have been messed with. The have the wrong dates to be originally soutached

Chris

[Diane]

The dates may be off but I have examined them and I do not believe they were altered. The stitching on the top of the scallop is intact on both caps.

Diane

[90th Light]

The dates may be off but I have examined them and I do not believe they were altered. The stitching on the top of the scallop is intact on both caps.

Diane

The pink soutache on the RB numbered tropical cap dated 1943, is totally wrong. It is a type of braid that was never used on caps. There were no RB numbered caps found with soutache in that "Beehive" find. Someone has added the soutache to deceive collectors to enhance the value of the cap. It is not hard for a dealer to find this information out, before they try to sell such an item.

The artillery soutached "Brandt", dated November 1942 is not much better. Except the soutache is the correct type but it is the narrow version which was not used by that maker. There is no evidence of any soutached caps being found in the "Beehive find" dated later than August 1942.

Such caps are worth more today if left in their original condition without a soutache,

Chris

[Tim O'Keefe]

The dates may be off but I have examined them and I do not believe they were altered. The stitching on the top of the scallop is intact on both caps.

Diane

Both of these caps have been altered post war. Agree with Chris that no HB sidecap dated Nov '42 had a soutache when it was found years ago, nor did any of the HB rbn# caps (such as this example with the pink soutache) from '43 found in the cache have a soutache but plenty of them do nowadays....

Years ago an enterprising fellow bought several hundred HB & CW tropical non-soutached sidecaps dated from Nov-Dec '42 to include HB rbn# caps dated from '43 and then had the soutache added to up the value. Now among collectors these altered caps are selling for less than the non soutached caps which are getting harder to find.

Basically if the beehive sidecap is dated prior to Aug '42 its ok with a soutache. If its after Aug '42 it has been added post war. The difficult point at this time is trying to determine the Aug '42's, the 842's are original or added & there are many examples that fall in each catagory ...?

& Chris interesting info on the "F" that would make more sense.

[tmca05]

Interesting trend.
Were any photos taken of the "beehive" horde and if so, can anybody post them?

[90th Light]

Interesting trend.
Were any photos taken of the "beehive" horde and if so, can anybody post them?

There were some pictures taken from a distance at one stage shown on WAF years ago if my memory serves me correctly but I do not know what happened to that thread ???

Any photos that now surface especially detailed or close up images would be very interesting indeed. However, I do not think anyone thought it important enough at the time to bother with a camera.

Keep in mind there was more than just tropical side-caps found so any images could be of interest to wider range of collectors than some realise,

Chris

[Tim O'Keefe]

There were some pictures taken from a distance at one stage shown on WAF years ago if my memory serves me correctly but I do not know what happened to that thread ???

Any photos that now surface especially detailed or close up images would be very interesting indeed. However, I do not think anyone thought it important enough at the time to bother with a camera.

Keep in mind there was more than just tropical side-caps found so any images could be of interest to wider range of collectors than some realise,

Chris

Have seen some photos of the caps used for insulation and also some very nice ties made up of cut up insignia etc. Still trying to get my hands on one of those ties...

Chris is right, not only lots of different makers sidecaps but also M40's, tunics, web gear, pants, all sorts of tropical gear was found and used years ago by the locals.
Don't think anyone really knows the full extent of the original cache. Don't think anybody knows the composition of the different sidecap makers 100% as no records were kept at the time of the "modern" discovery in the 70's.