Freikorps helmet, or early nazi party helmet?

[Trenchfoot]

Okay, last topic for today:)

Anyway, this helmet is stumping me. I noticed that the shields are painted on, which isn't super uncommon, because soldiers did this around 1933 when the nazis started to come to power. I'm just not sure if this helmet was used by freikorps before that, hence the other shield, or just an early nazi party helmet. It's also a ww1 converted to ww2 helmet and seems to be camouflaged.

[Fritz]

This looks like a post WW1 helmet that has a typical WW2 liner and fixments. The shield is certainly in the wrong place, it should be below the horn. Since the establishment of the Wehrmacht, decals were introduced and these were factory produced and not improvised, so this has been at sometime post WW2 applied. The helmet shell has suffered a from a heavy blow at some stage, cracking it in several places. I would look inside the shell to see if there are any makers marks stamped. I don't think I would go for this piece. There are holes at the sides where the previous fixing bales for the chiin straps had been. This should not be, these would have been closed, or the previous fixing posts at least left in place. So it would seem, the liner has probably been post WW2 added by a collector. As I say, I would not go for this helmet. The paintwork might also have been deliverately artificially rusted to make it look old. However, M.16 helmets were still worn in WW2 to a lesser degree.

[Kenny Andrew]

Yes I would agree with Paul, the rust around the bolts but no where else would indicate a repaint.