Named and researched Navy Binocular grounddig Argonne woods

[gerrit]

My brother Jan and I did a lot of searching on the Verdun & Argonne battlefields of WW1 in Northern France.

This is an amazing story of an US Navy binocular that was found near the Kaiser tunnel in the Argonne woods, the WW1 battlefield of The US expeditional Forces.
My brother collects binoculars and recently an add came up on marktplaats : a binocular that was found near the Kaisertunnel in the Argonne woods.
My brother bought that old Binocular, it had some nasty wear on the alu parts ( swolling up more then 3mm on some places), the original brown leather was all gone and the brass pieces were almost black.
Still he tought it had potential, it was a type that he had never seen before.
Normally things are kept the way we find them, but he decided that this could be worth all the effort!
His goal was to restore the binocular to its former glory, it costs him a lot of time but the result is fabulous!!
What stroke him when he cleaned it, was the service number of the former navy owner engraved in it, when he removed the old layers of paint: No 5202
Because he did a total restauration the No5202 became visual!!
Now the hunt for the man behind the binocular gegan.

The history of this soldier is known, it recently came up:
World War I Collector - WW1/WW2 Memorabilia Collection - Griffith, Charlie W.

Now the markings are clear also: V.N.S. Visual Naval Service
He prob. had lost it while he was on a reconnaissance flight above the trenches, right in front of the Kaisertunnel were the US lines!!!!
some info about his squadron
436th BOMBARDMENT SQUADRON
or on wikipedia i quote:
" the First Marine Air Squadron which deployed to France as the newly renamed 1st Marine Aviation Force in July 1918[7] and provided bomber and fighter support to the Navy's Day Wing, Northern Bombing Group".
United States Marine Corps Aviation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cheers,
Ger

here as some pictures of this Navy Binocular that once belonged to Charlie Griffith!!! 310720121038.jpg