Original Item. Only One Available. This is a very interesting original Austro-Hungarian WWI field cap identified to k.k. Landwehr-Infanterieregiment Jungbunzlau Nr. 10, or the Imperial-Royal 10th Landwehr Infantry Regiment headquartered at Jungbunzlau, today Mladá Boleslav in the Czech Republic. The cap retains its distinctive tall dark body, wide leather chinstrap with matching 10 buttons, bullion trim, and a bullion front cord terminating at a 10th Landwehr regimental badge. The upper cockade that would originally have completed the front insignia arrangement is now absent.

The 10th Landwehr Infantry Regiment was formed in 1889 from earlier Landwehr battalions and was based at Jungbunzlau, Bohemia. By 1914, the regimental headquarters together with the I and II Battalions were stationed at Jungbunzlau, while the III Battalion was based at Turnau, today Turnov.

The regiment recruited principally from the districts of Jungbunzlau and Turnau. Contemporary organizational records list its prewar ethnic composition as approximately 95 percent Czech, reflecting the predominantly Czech-speaking population of its Bohemian recruiting area.

At the outbreak of WWI, Landwehr-Infanterieregiment Nr. 10 formed part of the 52nd Landwehr Infantry Brigade within the 26th Landwehr Infantry Division, under the Austro-Hungarian IX Corps organization. The regiment was mobilized for service against Russia and entered the fighting on the Galician Front in 1914.

The regiment subsequently saw extensive service on the Eastern Front. During the major Brusilov Offensive of 1916, the 10th Landwehr was involved in the fighting around Lutsk in Volhynia, where the Austro-Hungarian front was broken by the Russian offensive. The regiment withdrew with the surrounding formations toward Kovel and the upper Stokhod River line.

In 1917, the Austrian Landwehr infantry regiments were redesignated as Schützenregimenter, and Landwehr-Infanterieregiment Jungbunzlau Nr. 10 became Schützenregiment Nr. 10. The regiment continued in Austro-Hungarian service through the final phase of WWI.

The hat has a bullion cord along the bottom edge and a pressed leather visor in good shape with crazing and retained edge trim. There are quite a few moth nips to the exterior but the field cap has held up well overall.

The interior shows a faux leather sweatband with a retained size tag, reading 52 ½. There is a shadow where another tag once was, maybe a maker’s label. The sweatband has some holes and the stitching is a bit weak. 

A very rare Austro-Hungarian field cap to find in any condition. The combination of the 10th Landwehr regimental buttons, surviving bullion cord and badge, dark Landwehr-style body, original chinstrap, size 52½ interior tag, and direct association with Landwehr-Infanterieregiment Jungbunzlau Nr. 10 makes this a particularly interesting Austro-Hungarian WWI headgear example. The missing upper cockade, exterior moth damage, weakened sweatband stitching, and lost interior label are the principal condition issues, while the surviving numbered insignia firmly associates the cap with a predominantly Czech regiment that served from Galicia and Volhynia through the later years of the First World War.