Posted 7 years ago
baldwinloc…
(22 items)
This is a WWII German Kriegsmarine Coastal Artillery visor cap, it is an authentic piece and as far as I can tell from my research it is an Admirals cap. Admirals caps in the Coastal Artillery had gold insignia and gold chin straps which this cap has. At the very least it's an authentic Coastal Artillery officer cap, but I like to think it belonged to an admiral.
It is Kriegsmarine. What colour is the piping around the top. Wehrmacht artillery I believe are red. I'm still learning the colours for the diff. branches in the Kraut services.
Well usually all the Coastal artillery caps had dark green piping to match the green of the insignia backing but this one has black, from what I have read the Coastal artillery were not very strict on uniform regulations and there are many examples of Coastal artillery caps with Heer insignia and many other variations.
Seems you are on the right path from what I've read. Could be engineer.
You have a nice find, but Admirals of the Coastal Artillery had a dark bluish-green piping on their visor caps. In the photo the piping appears to be black. There is some evidence (in the photo) that this cap's cord may have originally been silver, and over the years tarnished to a gold hue. All coastal artillery officers wore dark bluish-green shoulder board underlays, and used dark bluish-green cap piping on all officer ranks, except Reserve officers who wore black piping on their visor caps, which is what I believe that you have. If the cord is indeed gold, there is a possibility that it could be an Admiral of Reserve Coastal Artillery visor, but I have not seen a reference citing this. A very rare cap in any case, only the second one with black piping that I have seen in over 50 years of collecting (the other one had a silver cord), and during the same tine period I have seen at least a couple dozen Kriegsmarine admiral's visor caps. There is a beautiful detailed series of pictures of a coastal artillery admiral's cap in "German Headgear of World War II" by Pat Moran and Jon McGuire, Pg. 296-297.
Unlike the Wehrmacht, no Waffenfarbe or arm-of service piping was worn around the outer edge of the shoulder strap; instead, the Kriegsmarine used a variety of sleeved and shoulder board badges to denote branch of service (or department). I enjoyed seeing this, thanks for posting.
Interesting Max & glad you came along and shared you expertise. What is steering me away from buying, is the amount of fakes . The quality is often so good that collectors can't even spot them. Buyer beware.