ROKMC Field Made Helmet Covers

[Haebyeongdae]

I am sharing some photos exhibiting ROKMC helmet covers that were made In country. Starting around late 1967 , possibly earlier, until the end of the war ROK marines began using damaged shirts to make helmet covers. In some cases they just cut a section from the back of a damaged shirt and secured it to the helmet using the liner and sometimes an inner tube band. There is also veteran testimonies where the whole company would have it done by local tailors using damaged uniforms. The reason for this was purely aesthetic as they wanted all of their camouflage matching. ROKMC are known to be very prideful and their duck hunter camo was often seen as a status symbol. In photos you can tell some of these field expedient covers because of the lack of center seams, often baggy appearance, or large folds to help it fit the helmet better. From my large collection of photos this doesn’t seem like a one off situation as there are a ridiculous number of photos showing this practice, often with whole platoons using covers from rough cut cloth. Picking out the tailored versions in photos is impossible because they were made just like the issued ones. But I am willing to bet their usage was just as widespread. 

 

here is an example where you can see the material was nicely folded to form fit the helmet. Upon closer look there is no center seam

Two of the marines on the left are using field expedient covers, especially evident on the kneeling marine, there are large folds of loose material.

This m60 team is using cut material for their helmet covers, interestingly one marine appears to be using ERDL or ARVN Cloth 

The same m60 gunner from previous photos better showing the large swatch of ERDL type cloth used as a cover