Heer Infantry EM Overseas Cap with White Soutache

Product Description: This Heer Infantry EM Overseas Cap is an outstanding, all-original example. It’s a rare, early survivor, showing no signs of actual wear, and very likely never issued. The exterior of the cap is made of a fine quality Feldgrau (field gray) wool, typical for these early examples. The insignia are factory machine applied, and feature a 1939 pattern eagle and matching national colors cockade. The eagle has been applied with a textbook “zip and flip” technique in which the top edge was sewn with the eagle upside down and backwards, then flipped over and finished with straight machine stitching. None of the insignia stitching goes through the cap lining. This cap is also complete with desirable white “Russia braid” branch piping soutache for Infantry, as used prior to June 1942. There is no moth damage, the insignia is crisp, and the air ventilation grommets retain their original paint. Inside, this attractive cap is lined with a typical, early, taupe colored twill cotton fabric. There is a nice maker stamp for the firm of Albert Kempf, and also a size stamp, 54. This desirable Heer Infantry EM Overseas Cap is extremely clean and in near mint condition. These are very tough to find like this.

Historical Description: The “sidecap” was a part of the uniform worn by nearly all military, paramilitary, political and civil organizations in the Third Reich. It was a narrow hat that could be folded flat and tucked into a belt or haversack. This was, at the time, a very stylish type of uniform cap; in the German Army, it replaced the round “pork pie” style of field cap used in the Great War. The German name for this cap, in most organizations, was “Feldmütze”- field cap. Despite the name, it was often worn as a daily service cap by postal workers and other personnel who would never be deployed to the field.  The men and women who wore the sidecap gave it the nickname “Schiffchen,” meaning little boat, due to its shape. The sidecaps were made in the same type of fabric as the uniforms, in the uniform color particular to each organization. The sidecaps were adorned with branch-specific insignia, usually bearing some form of the German eagle and swastika national emblem. Many sidecaps also bore red, white and black national cockades. The insignia were usually embroidered or woven, but metal devices were used on some caps as well. Officer caps generally were distinguished by silver braid along the top edge and/or on the upper part of the flap at the front of the cap, and were often custom tailored from fine fabrics. The German military, and many other organizations, had broadly replaced the sidecap with a new, more practical cap featuring a brim, by 1943. But the sidecap continued to be worn by some troops until the end of the war.

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