World War I broke out on July 28, 1914. Imperial German soldiers entered the battlefield wearing pointed helmets. The pickelhaube was the pride of the German Empire, but the progress of the war exposed the flashiness of the pickelhaube, especially in the trench warfare stage, the shortcomings of the pickelhaube were revealed, the leather material had no protection, the metal fittings were too obvious, it was easy to become an enemy target, and it was expensive.
Because the German soldiers were standing in the trenches, their upper bodies were vulnerable to shrapnel and other injuries from artillery shells. In 1915, eighty percent of the soldiers of the German army were caused by shrapnel from artillery shells, and a quarter of them were wounded in the head, almost all of which were fatal.
Since the peaked helmet could not protect the head from bullets, shell fragments or flying stones, some units began to abandon the peaked helmet and began to improvise protective helmets.
Infantry General Hans-Emile Alexander Gede, the German commander deployed in the Vosges Mountains in early 1915, issued an order to the Chief of Staff, Lieutenant Colonel Hesse, to design an original protective steel helmet.
Later, Lieutenant Colonel Hesse worked on the prototype of the first German steel helmet, the Gade helmet (also known as the M1915 helmet). The Gade helmet consisted of two parts, a thick fur cap worn on the head, and a protective steel plate with chrome-nickel rivets 5 to 7 mm thick to protect the forehead and nose.
The appearance of the Gade steel helmet significantly reduced severe trauma to the head. But the disadvantages of the Gade steel helmet are also obvious, first of all, the Gade steel helmet exceeds 2 kg, and the soldier's wearing will increase the burden on the head;And the Gade helmet doesn't cover the neck and the back of the head, which can still be damaged. A total of 1,500 Gade helmets were produced in the Murhausen artillery workshop.
But in the end, the Prussian War Ministry did not approve the Gade steel helmet, and the cost of 1,500 Gade steel helmets was almost paid by Lieutenant Colonel Hesse himself, so in the end the production was not continued.
With the advent of the first M1916 helmet in the German army, most of the Ged helmets were recycled to make new helmets.
Another type of head protection for the Germans was the scharfschützenmaske. The sniper mask is made of solid steel, resembling a face shield, which is called the "elephant shield" in France.
The left side of the Sniper's mask is fully guarded, with two small slits in the area where the eye is worn for observation. There is a notch on the right side for sniper rifle design. There is a rivet strap on the inside that is used to wear it on the sniper's head.
At the beginning of 1915, Professor Friedrich Schweeder of the Technical University of Hannover and Chief Surgeon of the Naval Command, August Beer, jointly developed a new steel helmet, and they had studied the head trauma of German soldiers in the trenches. On September 4, 1915, Professor Schweeder was summoned to Berlin to attend a conference at which he made recommendations for the technical development of the helmet. The Chief of the General Staff of the German Army, Infantry General Erich von Falkenhayn, approved the proposal for the steel helmet and forwarded it to the Prussian War Ministry. In November 1915, the first samples of steel helmets were tested at the Kummersdorf test site south of Berlin, and the results were very successful, and the Army subsequently approved a large number of orders. At the end of January 1916, the first 30,000 steel helmets were delivered at the steel mill in Harz. In February 1916, steel helmets were distributed to front-line troops. At the beginning of the Battle of Verdun, some of the German soldiers were already wearing new steel helmets.
The official name of the new helmet was the M1916 helmet (Stahlschutzhelm Modell 1916). The M1916 exterior design comes from Professor Schweed's wife, who is an artist. Originally designed to be made of sheet steel, it was later changed to hot-pressed tempered chromium-nickel steel. Chromium-nickel steel has a thickness of 11 mm, made in six processes.
The picture shows the six processes of production of Professor Schweeder and M1916.
The M1916 is cylindrical in shape as a whole and weighs 12 to 14 kg. The steel helmet has a protruding brim on the front for shade and protection of the soldiers' eyes. On the sides and behind the helmet are neck guards, which are used to protect the neck and ears of the soldiers.
The inner helmet is a wearing lining system made of leather, consisting of a sturdy leather hoop with three double-pronged lightweight sheepskin tongues. On the inside of each tongue is a pocket made of white cloth with a horsehair padding to compensate for the gap between the helmet and the wearer's head. There are holes in the tongue that pass through a tightening strap that allows the lining to be adjusted. The chin strap is fastened to the rivet buttons on both sides of the inner side of the steel helmet.
Perspective view of the lining system.
The most striking feature of the M1916 is the protruding 8 mm ventilation holes on both sides, which were originally intended to install the forehead guards. According to the plan, 5% of the helmets will be fitted with a 1 cm thick forehead guard to enhance protection, but due to the lack of raw materials and the excessive weight of the forehead guard, the steel helmet will lean forward when moving, so the forehead guard is rarely used except for snipers and storm commandos.
The M1916 has a standard field gray appearance, but soldiers will often customize it to their liking, camouflaging it with paint, dirt, or leaves.
German soldier wearing an M1916 steel helmet in a trench.
After the M1916 steel helmet became the standard helmet of the German army, the production volume increased rapidly, and 10 factories in Germany were able to produce 3,500 to 4,000 steel helmets per day, and by the end of World War I in November 1918, a total of 8.5 million steel helmets were produced.
But in the battles of Verdunjang and the Battle of the Somme, the shortcomings of the M1916 were also exposed in use. For example, the leather chin strap used for fixation is defective, often loose, and sometimes difficult to unfasten. The biggest problem was the lining system, because the lining was made of leather, and after weeks or months of use in cold and damp trenches, the leather hoops would break, and the steel helmets were rarely replaced, so they caused problems for the soldiers. In 1917, the German army began to issue the M1916 modification, which solved these two problems: the adoption of a modified chin strap, which was connected using a metal D-ring;The hoop material has been replaced with metal, which is more durable and durable.
In order to distinguish it, the improved steel helmet is called M1917 steel helmet.
M1916 on the left and M1917 on the right. There is no difference between the two in appearance, the main difference is in the lining system.
In 1918 several improvements were made to the helmet. The first is the problem of steel helmet coating, because the use of paint at that time would produce strong reflections in sunlight and moonlight, so various attempts were made to improve the reflection, such as adding sand or felt to the paint, making the surface of the steel helmet rough.
The chin strap ends are no longer fastened to the rivet buttons on either side of the helmet, but directly to the hoops. The chin strap is also divided into two styles, one is one-piece and the other is two-piece, with a metal hook at one end to hook the other with a D-ring on the chin.
The last improvement was the M1918 ear clipping type (Stahlschutzhelm Modell Mit Ohrenausschnitt 1918). Because the neck guard of the steel helmet is too long, covering the ears, it will affect the soldier's hearing, and when the shell falls nearby, it will produce ** resonance in the ear, so the M1918 adds a notch to the side neck guard. However, by the end of World War I, the M1918 ear clipping type was only produced in small quantities, mainly for cavalry and signal troops.
The M1918 has a Stahlhelm M18 Für Panzerfahrer for tank crews. The most important feature of this armored steel helmet is that it does not have a front eaves.
Finally, there is an M1918 steel helmet specially designed for the Turkish army. This helmet does not have the distinctive large front eaves and does not have side elongated neck guards. Probably 5,400 of these M1918 Turkish steel helmets were produced, only some of which were delivered to the Turkish army. There is a ** show that this steel helmet was worn by the German Freikorps after the war.
Before 1918, German steel helmets had only improvised camouflage patterns. On July 7, 1918, Ludendorff, Chief of the General Staff of the German Army, signed Order No. 91,366 to officially introduce the first standardized camouflage pattern, known as the three-color camouflage livery (buntfarbenanstrich). The tri-color camouflage livery uses three color blocks, rusty brown, ochre yellow and green, separated from each other by finger-thick black lines. The color paint is matte and applied by hand using a brush.
In the past, in order to solve the problem of reflective steel helmets, soldiers would make simple helmets out of cloth to cover steel helmets. The first officially issued helmet was the white helmet issued in the winter of 1916 for white snow camouflage. In February 1917, a grey helmet was issued. The size of the helmet is similar to that of a steel helmet, and there are hooks at the bottom to secure the steel helmet.
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