WWI Burlap Helmet

[JimD]

To be honest, I do not know if this a British or Canadian helmet. Perhaps someone can help.

It is a Model 1916 helmet marked HS 394 with the later styled chinstrap buckle and round rivet attachment to the shell.

It has a coarse two-piece hessian cover with a stenciled machine gun badge to the front and a "308" on the underside.

The chinstrap has "Sgt Thomas Brady Co. D, 14th M. G. Bn." written in ink.

The burlap cover shows rust stains that correspond and were caused by rust patches on the helmet and the areas on the

underside of the helmet brim not covered by the burlap show fading to the paint, which leads me to believe

that the cover has been in place a long, long time.

 

I am not strong on Commonwealth research. I found a 14th Canadian MG Company attached to the 2nd Canadian Division.

I also found a 41st MG Company which joined the British 14th (Light) Division in 1916 and later left to move into the

14th MG Battalion in March 1918.

Finally, there was a 14th MG Company which joined the British 32nd Division in 1916 and moved to the 32nd Bn MG Company in 1918.

These are all candidates. Unfortunately, the most productive line of inquiry, the name written on the chinstrap, is a very common

name and my limited CW research skills have produced no definitive result. Any help in this area would be appreciated.

Jim

 

[JimD]

 

 

 

[Bugme]

Looks like a Royal hat badge stencil. Similar to this WWI Canadian hat badge. I know, not much help.

[Allan H.]

Jim,

 

GORGEOUS helmet. I don't even collect WWI and this is a piece that makes me say "I wish this was in my collection." What a truly historic piece. Thank you for sharing it. I wish that I had some solid info for you, but you'll just have to settle for my saying that I admire it greatly.

 

Allan

[P-40Warhawk]

Great helmet, just a thought here, could the unit on the chinstrap be a US unit? There was a 14th MG BN that was part of the 5th Infantry Division in WWI. The way "Co. D" is written seems sort of American to me, I thought in WWI it was common among UK units to use "Coy" as an abbreviated term for 'company'? Maybe look for a roster of the US unit and see if the Sgt was part of it.