old fake SS cap

[Friedrich-Berthold]

fake Kupper cap from the 1950s, seldom seen

I think Bob Coleman can agree with me on this piece.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

The cap had certain features like Bundeswehr caps and had little padding. But the tailoring of the thing was impressive, with the high crown. Authentic early caps tended to have a lower crown...but only tended. The high crown and saddle shape were a conceit of elite cavalry regiments in the imperial period, as you can see from images of the Crown Prince.

But this cap had really little padding and plastic, too.


Or maybe this cap was made by Erich Beinhorn, a major Lieferant of the time.
It was not made by the dagger king, I think.

[Bob Hritz]

I well remember this style, which I first saw as a young collector, back in the early 1960s. They were impressive with the massive front peak. I had a similar hat, and always regretted that I returned it to the seller. Of course, $30.00 was a considerable amount of money, back then, and I bought an SS Model 1933 dagger and single decal SS helmet with the refunded $30.00.

Even in those cloudy days of the past, I remember the hat having little similarity in material construction, to an original Heer officer hat that I had.

Bob Hritz

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Thanks for this note. This piece differs from the dagger king's Berlins aelteste Muetzenfabrik caps, which Freiherr von Moellendorff first outed as far back as 1969. This genre of cap is different, and made nicely, save for its plastic features. I thought I would add this little remnant for the enlightenment of all. I am loathe to engage in the same parlor games as other cap collectors, since I am skeptical of check lists. That is, I cannot make a catalog of the leading features of putative authentic and putative reproduction caps. But this piece above is a seldom seen variant of a rare cap.


As a corrective here below is an early black SS cap with badges out of the ordinary, but not impossible. One seldom sees the 1934 NSDAP eagle, and this badge might have been added later, but the cap, itself, is a pleasing one. The latter bears little similarity to the former (other than the color), which colleague Hritz and I share in our collective experience.

[Bob Hritz]

Those who are old enough may remember Ted Lenkel, of Palisades, New jersey. He offered me a Waffen-SS officer visor hat for a large wollen Reichskriegsflagge. I mailed the flag and received the Alteste Waffen-SS general's hat. Even then, it just did not have the same attributes as an original Heer visor. Of course, Mr. Lenkel refused to undo the deal. I also wish I still had that hat as it is a great piece for study and presentation of what NOT to collect.

Of course, to this day, I have never had the means, when one came available, to obtain an authentic Waffen-SS general's visor hat. I am content to examine those, in collections, and to study the attributes that I would like to see in every authentic hat.

Bob Hritz

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Grey SS caps of whatever rank are such a source of controversy and dissent, are they not? Ergo, my preference for their darker sibling as a more straight forward proposition. But all the internet images have fouled up this genre too amid an unending challenge and response that would please Toynbee, were he here. The Berlins aelteste Muetzenfabrik caps tended to have a lower crown, and were cheaply made. I do not know why they excite so much awe and reproach among some other headwear observers. I recall a much better made genre of fake from the 1960s that was much closer to the real thing than the dagger king fakes. However, I have no illustration of the thing. These caps were much closer to the wartime Kleiderkasse cap, actually. German-Americans had them made up by hatters in the FRG of the era.

[colt45]

I think this is an old crusher fake??

[Friedrich-Berthold]

I shall leave this artillery field cap to others. I can claim no expertise in THE area of grey SS caps that is the most laden with doom.

I have spent so much time reading posts about this kind of cap that my eyes roll back in my head. Yet, they do appear every once and a while, a real example of this cap.


However, I am not a collector of Waffen SS material, so I invite Mr. Coleman and Mr. Hritz as well as the others here to spread their knowledge.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

I can recall a series of fakes. privately made by a German American in the FRG of the 1960s, that looked very much like this piece, which is authentic. I repeat, this is a real cap. The fakes were made of trikot, the proportions were correct, and the shape of the crown was this plain saddle type of wartime.

I repeat, this is a real cap, however.


I did not have a photograph of the cap ca. 1970. There were white and yellow piped examples here in the neighborhood, in fact. Where are they now?

I think this cap illustrated here went to the UK.

Happy collecting.