Tailor made tropical cloth Officer/NCO jackets

[doomtown]

Awesome, thank you for the information fellas, very informative!

[GAMS1]

One of the variations of this ribbed cotton cloth jackets , faded like WH
Tropical jackets !
In a mint condition , they do have the same green shade as the tropical german uniforms .
Nick

[Tim O'Keefe]

Hi Nick

This is an interesting thread. Apologies, but am having trouble following it a little bit. Probably do to the translation. Are you saying that the twill the Germans used to make some of the tropical tunics & uniform items is of French (military) origin ? Are there any French military uniform items that pre-date 1940 with this material ?

thanks
Tim

[GAMS1]

Hi Nick

This is an interesting thread. Apologies, but am having trouble following it a little bit. Probably do to the translation. Are you saying that the twill the Germans used to make some of the tropical tunics & uniform items is of French (military) origin ? Are there any French military uniform items that pre-date 1940 with this material ?

thanks
Tim

Exactly ! Look at the post 13 and 16 and you will see 2 types of protective uniforms made in this ribbed cotton pre 1940 .
The one in the post 13 is postwar period and made in a plain cotton cloth ,
not of the ribbed cotton .
This ribbed cotton cloth is typical in the 1935-40 period and certainly later used by the german Army .
These 2 lower pockets jackets in post 16 were also retailored as german summer 4 pockets jackets , NCO or OFF .
One was offered on the E Stand last year , as "french made" jacket ...
Nick

[Tim O'Keefe]

Thanks Nick !

Do you mean this fabric ?
Here is a thread that discusses this subject somewhat...

http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...d.php?t=850880

[GAMS1]

About the same colour as the post 16 french jacket ...!
The thread was already talking about this fact .
Nick

[Tim O'Keefe]

About the same colour as the post 16 french jacket ...!
The thread was already talking about this fact .
Nick

Sorry Nick,
Guess i still do not understand ? Can you show me standard German tropical tunics made from this material ?

[GAMS1]

When you look at the faded french jacket of the post 16 and the faded german jacket of the post 20 , i think you have a good match of faded colours !
I'm pretty sure this post 20 jacket has been made with french cloth ...
Nick

[Tim O'Keefe]

Ok got it, understand and agree with you. The Germans used original French material for some of their tropical jackets/caps etc. Here is a photo from another fellow member (Thanks) of a French jacket dated early 1940.

Thanks Nick !

[Alex Ciavaglia]

Ok got it, understand and agree with you. The Germans used original French material for some of their tropical jackets/caps etc. Here is a photo from another fellow member (Thanks) of a French jacket dated early 1940.

Thanks Nick !

I think that French cloth is very close to the german one!

What do you think, could all tropical cloth to be produced for all the war in France and not in Germany?

[Hptm. Fuhrmann]

I think that French cloth is very close to the german one!

What do you think, could all tropical cloth to be produced for all the war in France and not in Germany?

If I might pick up this point, I don't think that all fabrics used on german tropical clothes were produced in france, but just the the one that has been encountered on french uniforms prior to 1940. There was a small variety of different fabrics used and I'm going to elaborate on this now a little more.


Those are the 2 major types of cotton twill fabric you can see on german tropical uniforms if you disregard the use of cord for breeches or italian olona for late war uniforms. The fabric in the middle is the 'french' fabric we talk about, the other fabric is what I would call german made fabric. My reasons for this are the following: The 'french style' cotton twill fabric hasn't been seen in any german uniforms prior to 1940 and after 1945, while it was clearly in use for french uniforms before 1940 and has been heavily used after 1945 for their M47 uniforms. The most commonly found german made lightweight fabrics before 1940 were moleskin, hbt (often mixed with or made purely out of linen) or the style of cotton twill fabric you can see in my picture next to the 'french' stuff: A gabardine/denim-style, ribbed cotton twill that can be seen in the lining of most early war wool uniforms.

Here is a nice uniform set http://virtualgrenadier.com/sale_item.php?iid=5202 where the tunic, trousers and cap are made from what I would call 'german fabric', while the shoulder straps are made from 'french fabric'.
So my assumption is that the germans used up stocks of french fabrics and had the french weaving mills continue to produce this fabric after the french surrendered and while they were at it, also had them make it in different colors, like tan/beige and blue-grey for the Luftwaffe tropical uniforms as seen here http://www.virtualgrenadier.com/sale_item.php?iid=931 and here http://www.virtualgrenadier.com/sale_item.php?iid=4064

That's my theory so far, but besides my observations and the logic I put behind them I have nothing to back this up.

[doomtown]

Could I slightly hijack this topic and ask about the liner on one of the jackets I posted at the beginning? It looks like a Dutch jacket liner reworked for the WH. Haven't seen this very often.

[Tim O'Keefe]

I think that French cloth is very close to the german one!

What do you think, could all tropical cloth to be produced for all the war in France and not in Germany?

Hi Alex

Agree this looks like a match. The tropical shirts i think likely came from French material ? Leaving whipcord aside,
would not use the word "all" but "much of" the French tropical cloth material used by Germany during the war.

For example the sage green material used by the DAK was likely German.

with kind regards
Tim

[NZMark]

The Germans utilized nearly everything the French could supply - the base tunic material, shirts (I don't believe they made German shirts from French material but I'm open to the idea), sweaters (model 36 and 40). It just makes sense to see tunics made from French stocks.
Like Tim, I have one made from the exact same material (an NZ veteran souvenir)- weave for weave. I've overlayed a section of my tunic over the French example...
Mark
NZ

[Rawski]

That's my theory so far, but besides my observations and the logic I put behind them I have nothing to back this up.

It's a good theory. Perhaps the materials were from a deal with Vichy France in addition to mills in the occupied zone.

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