British black / blackened 37ptn webbing

[ILH]

I think you've answered your own question when you mention paint on the buckles, but here's a bit more:

1)The braces are ww2 economy issue.
2)The ammo pouch buckles? Regardless of wether the funny one is a genuine or a replacement, it apears to be a WW2 economy issue variety (heard of, but not seen one 'till now) - I don't see even a tinpot Cadet RSM allowing it on parade - it ain't polished!
3) which brings us back to your point about paint on the buckles; paint = wartime, polish = peacetime (mostly).

therefore..... it must be wartime??

[Grimebox]

When you put it like that it's hard to argue!
I must admit that it does look very 'slapdash' if it was owned by a cadet

[Battery Command Post]

I think you've answered your own question when you mention paint on the buckles, but here's a bit more:

1)The braces are ww2 economy issue.
2)The ammo pouch buckles? Regardless of wether the funny one is a genuine or a replacement, it apears to be a WW2 economy issue variety (heard of, but not seen one 'till now) - I don't see even a tinpot Cadet RSM allowing it on parade - it ain't polished!
3) which brings us back to your point about paint on the buckles; paint = wartime, polish = peacetime (mostly).

therefore..... it must be wartime??

I'm not trying to be difficult, but I don't agree with any of these statements.

1)The braces are ww2 economy issue.

Actually they're not. They are the multi-piece contruction type, made necessary by the fact that the one piece type braces required 'reduction weave' technology, that many manufacturers didn't have.

2)The ammo pouch buckles? Regardless of wether the funny one is a genuine or a replacement, it apears to be a WW2 economy issue variety (heard of, but not seen one 'till now) - I don't see even a tinpot Cadet RSM allowing it on parade - it ain't polished!

It's a standard and quite common Canadian-manufactured buckle, made from brown-painted steel (missing it's paint of course). The Canadian Broad Arrow mark on the inner pouch flap confirms this.
Tinpot Cadet RSM? how lovely

3) which brings us back to your point about paint on the buckles; paint = wartime, polish = peacetime (mostly).

There's no proof for this theory. Much post-war, peacetime, British webbing was made with bonderized black fittings that couldn't be polished. I can't tell from the photo, but the haversack may have been made this way.

I would guess it is probably a set of old cadet's webbing, but it's very hard to say. They're just 'tinpot' soldiers anyway, apparently.

Rob

[karkee]

Grimebox,

Your blackened Pattern 1908 haversack may have been Irish. In 1923, Mills Equipment Company, Limited supplied a large order of Pattern 1908 sets (sans the ET and helve carrier) to the Irish Free State. This webbing was apparently made in a green shade, but appears to have been quickly blackened by the Irish. In addition to being marked "M.E.CO. 1923," this webbing will feature a "Fianna Fail" stamp (FF surrounded by a sunburst) of the Irish Army.

The following pictures show Irish soldiers on parade at Curragh Camp circa 1940...

[Warspite]

Interestingly a friend of mine was talking to someone in the Irish army who had the job of burning old sets of 08 webbing relatively recently. Apparently he nearly had a coronary when he was told the going rate for a set of 08, even the black Irish stuff.

[karkee]

That story makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up! lol

I felt the same way when I heard that Japanese clients were buying US WWII militaria so they could resell it in Japan to be burnt as ancestral offerings...