Opinions on this lot of civilian helmets?

[christek]

Hello all,

I believe this set to be of the war era civilian issue air-raid etc. helmets. I already have one very similar but not quite the same in regards to small things like the chinstrap bales and liner materials and it's completely un-marked. Can anyone please tell me anything about the markings on these shells? They appear to be the same character - an honest set? I have not heard of this type helmet being faked but would hate to find out later the characters are jibberish! Cheers

[Tinhat]

I can't help with the translation, but I would think they are original, probably from a factory, I also have a similar with a 'No. 10', i found it odd that the numbers were written in that manner, but I confirmed it with a couple of people in Japan that the format was used.
Looking forward to other comments on this.

Steve.

[ghp95134]

The kanji is 美 [mi/bi/utsuku~] which, by itself, means beautiful. In this case it might be a store or factory with the logo {美} ... or maybe for a town or city that begins with the 美 kanji, e.g., 美濃加茂 Minokamo.

Off tangent and slightly irrelevant [and irreverent]:
In Korea and China (and earlier in Japan), 美 represents America [Miguk: 美国]. Supposedly, this Korean word is the origin of the pejorative "gook". Allegedly, during the Korean War, Koreans would point at US soldiers and say "Mi-Guk" [American]. The Americans heard "Me, Gook" ... and the word stuck. That's what I learned when stationed in the ROK in 1989.

--Guy

[Jareth]

Shame to break them up. In my opinion since they don't have a high individual value they should be kept together

[christek]

Many thanks for the insight gentlemen - Much appreciated. I did suspect they formed a set from the same factory or air-raid shelter etc.

Shame to break them up. In my opinion since they don't have a high individual value they should be kept together

I completely agree Jareth - The fact they may have been a matching set of four is what grabbed my interest. Certainly not something you see every day. In any case, I did get all four in the end Cheers

[christek]

I was expecting these to be of iron construction like the others I have but these four are in fact made from a light weight, non-magnetic metal, perhaps aluminium. There are no markings on the shell as is often the case with these 'domestic' helmets. The elementary liners are constructed from hessian and paper.
I love the history attached to these pots - Emperor Hirohito made his first ever broadcast to the Japanese people in August 1945, he asked his subjects “to endure the unendurable and bear the unbearable”, and he brought to an end a state of wars that had wracked his country for about ten years - Interestingly the Emperor never spoke explicitly about 'surrender' or 'defeat', but simply remarked some words to the extent that the war 'did not turn in Japan's favour'. I feel this classic understatement is representative of Japans terrible policy to fight to the end. This policy had a terrible cost to both the Imperial army and the Japanese civilian population. If the war had driven on and the allies had to invade Japan; these ‘civilian’ types of helmets would have been strewn around the battlefields alongside their poorly trained occupants.