"Pink" smock or not?

[90th Light]

There is still some good stuff in Estonia. Have look at this;

http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...=1#post5926482

Chris

[pete]

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WOW! have not seen this thread in the last few months, great work on the HBT!

Pete

[n160]

tidbit

One of the initial dealers who handled the pink smocks told me that they came from Berman & Nathan, costumers in London in '79 or '80. He said they had had them for some years and sold off "bales" of them. They were unused, but many had mouse & storage damage.

After printing camo, and making repros (including smocks) and owning & fondling a lot of originals, IMHO these are not reproductions per se. They are too good for repros of that time. But the variations in color, thread size, and garment size are also clearly intentional. I don't think they are German WWII.

I'd vote for postwar contract- maybe some sort of border police? Czech? Yugoslav? But how would they get from (assumedly) eastern Europe to London during the Cold War?

Would the Brits have been crazy enough to make them to go with the training (OPFOR) tunics and helmets? A stretch perhaps, but it could fit with the costume house having ended up with them. That they are unworn could explain the lack of photos.

Whatever they are, they are too good to be repros from that time and there are too many things "wrong" to be WWII. Whoever made them has certainly caused a lot of trouble.

[phild]

That is a very intelligent post above. Much of it I agree with, but a few things I question.

We have heard the story of Berman and Nathan involvement before. I can not fully discount that they (the firm) never had possession of these, but I feel very sure that they did not produce them...for many reasons.

One fact that seems to get very little attention from most people about these smocks is that many from this lot were property of the Soviet Museum system as is born out by the stamps discussed earlier. If Berman and Nathan did in fact sell this lot, the smocks were at least at some point earlier owned by the USSR.

The theory of post war military use has also been raised before. In order for this to be possible EVERY characteristic of these that would support this theory would also explain WWII German contract outside of Germany. In addition we are much more likely to have evidence of some kind of post WWII military use or development of these and we have none.

My biggest issue with post war military use is that no country would have bothered to copy the smock for there own use in the detail that these were made....down to hand stitched tie cord holes and the use of German WWII buttons. The theory was started when we did not know what the stampings were or what the removed markings in the pockets were....now we know and we know that these exact stampings have appeared in a number of other 100% original W-SS captured uniform items from the Soviet museum system.

I think that the "question" of these smocks was thrown off at the outset of their appearance (and has continued for 33 years for the same reason) because they were compared 1:1 to the known German produced cotton duck type smocks and found to be different in many respects...so end of story. That 1:1 comparison was the only tool we had 30 years ago and a lot of people made up there minds and in other cases staked their egos and reputations on these being fake, or movie props or post military made or anything but WWII.

I realize that now....so long after the fact and with all of the BS we have all put up with in regards to fakes, dirty players in this field and every kind of fraud you can think off, that many discount the stamps as also being added to give these some kind of provenance and many have said as much on this forum.

I know for a fact that the stamps (and places cut out and inked out) were in these when they came on the market in Germany (80-81) and so do many others. We also know that at the time the stamps were considered a big problem for these as no one knew what they were or why they were in these.....it would be almost 10 later before the first other items would show up with similar stamps and collectors while not liking the stamps in the items so much would for a number years appreciate that the stamps were only in WWII original items.....until the later 1990s (15 to 20 years AFTER the pink smocks were found with them) when the stamps stated being faked and added to fakes!

[pete]

.

To me this is clearly a real and actually rare smock. The interesting is that it seems most of the collecting community, in general, has long dismissed these and has not read this thread for what it is and what we have uncovered. I have already been contacted by one very interested collector who has been now offered a TIDY sum for his smock in comparison to the not so distant previous "like them or not" prices on the estand or private and this from an established buyer who also wants any more he can buy too, and based on the most recent Ruptured duck smock that surfaced. Why is that suddenly happening and he is not the only one looking?

Pete

[tgn]

To me this is clearly a real and actually rare smock. The interesting is that it seems most of the collecting community, in general, has long dismissed these and has not read this thread for what it is and what we have uncovered. I have already been contacted by one very interested collector who has been now offered a TIDY sum for his smock in comparison to the not so distant previous "like them or not" prices on the estand or private and this from an established buyer who also wants any more he can buy too, and based on the most recent Ruptured duck smock that surfaced. Why is that suddenly happening and he is not the only one looking?

Pete

Hope you are correct, as I have a nice example with no altered markings and the drawstring... I never cared much if they were real or not. I thought they looked nice for display and I got mine when everyone were sure they were fake for very little.

Tom

[90th Light]

Hope you are correct, as I have a nice example with no altered markings and the drawstring... I never cared much if they were real or not. I thought they looked nice for display and I got mine when everyone were sure they were fake for very little.

Tom

"drawstring" ???

Tom, did your one come with a correct period drawstring ?

One of the things that has been held against these smocks by some, is the fact that they have no drawstrings.

Do you know if your one was found with the drawstring at the time ?

Chris

[tgn]

"drawstring" ???

Tom, did your one come with a correct period drawstring ?

One of the things that has been held against these smocks by some, is the fact that they have no drawstrings.

Do you know if your one was found with the drawstring at the time ?

Chris

It came with drawstring when it was offered to me. That's all I know. I don't think it is a typical drawstring, but it does look period.

[Panzerknacker12]

Why is it that in every other SS camo item, you can find pieces of all the different patterns in the construction of a item? For instance, zeltbahns made from different patterns...the edging, head hole covers, smock sleeves from different patterns, helmet cover panels and loops made from different non-matching patterns, etc. Point = I have yet to see ANY wartime examples ( smocks, helmet covers, caps, zelts, etc.) with this pink fabric. Ever. All the other examples of the SS patterns show up in various items. Why is that? Because it was printed after the war.

I personally have only seen type II smocks made from this fabric, and it shows up nowhere else. Why are there not any helmet covers or caps at least from the scraps when they were made? The Germans wasted nothing, which is a PROVEN FACT with all the other patterns.

Why is it every one of these smocks have the same exact shade and colors? The Waffen-SS couldnt do this with their production of all the other patterns during the war, they always had minor or major shade and color differences, that is also a fact.

Why is this the only series of smocks (every one ive encountered) that has ZERO pieces from other patterns? None. Every one the same exact shade, same exact pattern on all pieces of the smock.

Its fake, get over it.

[pete]

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I am not sure why are there no other scrap pieces in this run of smocks but are there also not other smocks or items of camo which do not, at least not all of them, have scrap visible 100% of the time? Its clear they used scrap, likely IF they had it in each case. Did they have scrap for these? Who knows, maybe they did maybe they didn't for some reason? Does a HBT smock have scrap visible? There are some things I think we just cannot answer sometimes until we see it, or, have we seen it all? The undisputed thing which we now know, where it could not be answered before, is that these smocks, whoever made them and however, with whatever, were physically present in the USSR system in the right period, any other info aside such as the 1947 info. They were in the correct location long (many decades) before fakers and a market for fakes and also importantly along with other SS captured material and are stamped as such and that these stampings have yet to be observed in quantity or on other items of fake WW2 Uniforms or equipment. Again, I think the key is that we have not seen everything an the books are still "to be written" so to speak. These are totally exciting for the small minority, i think, who can look at our hobby from the then and not the now. It gives a certain clarity i feel in making good "archeologist" type interpretations.

Tom any chance you can post your unaltered markings and smock?



Kind regards,

Pete

[Thorsten B.]

Again, I think the key is that we have not seen everything an the books are still "to be written" so to speak. These are totally exciting for the small minority, i think, who can look at our hobby from the then and not the now.

Exactly!!!

[phild]

I am not sure why are there no other scrap pieces in this run of smocks but
Does a HBT smock have scrap visible?
Kind regards,

Pete

Exactly as well!!!

The reason that these smocks have no mismatched camo scrap incorporated is that they were made in a place (factory and country) that unlike the German factory (factories?) that made SS smocks had no history in making SS camo previous to these.....hence no scrap fabric to use!! They did not think to import scrap 600km from Germany to use in the pocket flaps for these.....I guess just poor planning!

Some people post on this thread want us to believe that the use of mismatched scrap in German camo clothing production was standard when in fact it was not at all the case when looked at across all services and items produced. Their response will be "No we don't, it was just typical in SS smock production"......when in fact that is not even true across all SS smocks produced (hand printed and hbt being 2 examples where this mis-match is not really found).

WHY should the SS camo items made in Norway and using the SS fabric printed in Norway.......now proven thanks to some hard work by Norwegian collectors, used German made scrap material that never existed in Norway?

As stated by Pete and well known by SS camo collectors, several other 100% SS camo patterns (including hbt which is a fabric and not a pattern I realize) can be found in smocks and helmet covers but not zelts and others not in helmet covers.......where are the hbt zelts? Of course, stupid me, hbt is not suitable for zelts......nor is the fabric used in these smocks........

[CWP]

If these were in fact in the USSR museum system why were bales of these released 10 years before the fall of the Wall, and nothing else? They held on to countless thousands of ID documents, uniforms of all types, weapons and weapon parts, field gear, etc., but released these bales of unique smocks and nothing else? Were any more of these found after 1990 or were the bales that appeared in the early 80s the only known examples?

[RobertE]

Chris, the fact that we have not seen more released uniform items does not mean there were not more. It just means we have not seen them.

There were of course many other uniform items released from Soviet bloc inventories in the 1980's, some of which are posted in this thread.

Don't forget that the Soviets didn't release by collector category: they didn't decide to release SS uniforms in one year, and other items the following spring. Museum and war stocks of all types were dumped together, and didn't follow collector genres.

In other words, the same period of time when these smocks appeared, so did thousands of K98s and east German lugers, for instance. Collectively, there was a mass of WWII German material released, it's just not all SS.

s/f Robert

[tgn]

Here is my "pink" smock and close-up of drawstring that came with it.