WW1 German cap - which unit? Krankenträger? Uhlan?

[Rami S]

Hi,

I have this WW1 german cap. But, what puzzles me is, what unit or color the cap band is? I know there is variety of colors, but cap is marked TB13 for train battallion 13, an Wuertembergische supply unit, color should be blue. The landes cocade is worn and difficult to say which colors it is supposed to have. It has BA XI? depot stamp.

[spandau]

Hi

Cracking cap, the band colour is violet on my monitor which would make it for a feldgeistliche, or padre. This may well be an other ranks assistant to the actual padre who may well have been an officer.

There are two examples in the Somers book just like this one. Krauss talks about the padre peaked cap but does not cover the field cap, the colour is always purple for priests throughout the period 1914 - 1945.

Your BA XI stamp marks them out as from Thuringia Hesse-Nassau but I would suspect that maybe the unit stamp may be JB 13 for jager battalion rather than TB for train............or it may be a padre attached to the train ? does the "t" look like a "j" to you as you have the cap to hand.

Rare cap either way, congrats.

That is my theory hope it helps.

cheers

Tony

[CCMJR]

Is it me or does it look like the Landeskokarde has another cockade right behind it? The painting on the national cockade does not look right to me. The CZ mark and number are not imperial marks, so this cap has me wondering. Another observation is that the top of the inside appears darkened, as from hair oil or grease, but there is really no evidence of sweat on the band of the lining. Perhaps, it's just the lighting of the photos, but I thought it worth mentioning.

I've never seen any information regarding enlisted personnel in the clergy branch. It sounds plausible, but has anyone seen anything about it?

It would have been interesting if Somers had shown the insides of the caps in his book for comparison.

CCMJR

[Rami S]

Thank you for input. The cap band is violet. I think too it is feldgeistliche color. It is TB13. There is dark stains at band of lining too, not visible at image. Landeskokarde is alright, it is sewn to piece of cloth and cloth to cap band. CZ stamp is definetely theater stamp or alike. The cap came along with colelction of finnish caps and it was descriped wrongly as WW1 german engineer´s cap (violet is color of finnish engineer) I am going to put the cap for sale and I wanted to descripe the cap as good as I can. Thanks for help and inputs

[spandau]

Hi

More info come to light on this unusual cap. I recently bought the excellent book feldzug by M Baldwin, an established collector in the Uk of German WW1. In it he has a cap with the same colour cap band and attributes it too post 1916 other ranks of the train, the darker blue cap band sometimes, he suggests had a purple tint to it. This may help put another theory on it or it may be a red herring !

cheers

Tony

[asterperious]

Certain types of dye's are what reffered to as 'fugitive' meaning that over time the dye is not fixed once set and they colour shift form the orignal colour to another usually lighter colour on the same spectrum on acount of exposure to UV in daylight, checmical instability in the orinal formula or the base material reacting. In any event it is very possible this was a deep blue at one point and has shifted purple over time leading to some confusion. Never the less, a lovely cap.

[CCMJR]

Asterperious,

Your explanation is certainly possible, but one would not expect such an even color change throughout the band and matched by the piping. But the cap does, after all, have a marking of a Train battalion, so the theory may well be right.

I think what Baldwin is referring to is the official color change for the Train from hellblau to kaliblau, the latter being much darker.

CCMJR

[Rami S]

Thank you, Spandau for information. The theory of cap being anTrain batallion cap is very interesting, after all it is TB13 stamped as well.

[spandau]

Hi

If in doubt always go with original stampings, I reckon train is more likely than chaplin given the rarity of the latter.

did you end up selling the cap ?

cheers

Tony