Original Items: Only One Set Available. This is a very nice early pattern German WWII Heer Army Kriegspfarrer (Field Chaplain) M-36 Tunic with matching breeches, the first time that we have had one of these rare uniforms! Chaplains were not very common at all, and we have only had two German Chaplain visor caps before. The tunic has some very interesting characteristics, and shows only light wear from service. It is in very good condition, and there is a tailor label on the right interior just below the slash pocket, which which has a very stylized company name that we cannot make out, but the rest of the address is clear:

??????-???
Saarbrücken 1
Eisenbahnstr. 60 Tel. 20003

Inside the pocket is an even better label, giving the name of the chaplain that the uniform was issued to:

Johann-Martin
Thomsen

This matches the worn thread embroidered JMT on the inside of the breeches, so this is a set that has been together since WWII!

The tunic is made from lovely "whipcord weave" wool gabardine, in the standard Heer feldgrau (field gray) color. It features four pockets with scalloped flaps and pebbled magnetic buttons, which look to be made from pebbled aluminum with plated steel backings and eyelets. The front closure features five of the same buttons on the right breast flap meeting an equal number of reinforced buttonholes on the left flap. They are all bright aluminum, and are marked on the back with size 21 m/m along with HOCHFEINE QUALITÄT (Highest Quality). They also all bear the "barred A" trademark logo of F. W. Assmann & Söhne of Lüdenscheid, a large maker of belts, buttons, and other accoutrements, and are sewn directly to the fabric. There are also two hook and loop collar securing fasteners, which are fully functional.

The interior is lined with with a very nice gray brown rayon cotton blend twill fabric, while the sleeves are lined with white rayon. We do not see any major repairs, but there is some staining and tearing to the lining, as well as some small areas of stitch repair. We did note that the inner breast pocket is on the right side, not the left where it usually would have been, and there is no eyelet for an officer dagger, so this tunic was made specifically for a chaplain.

The tunic is adorned with the usual rank and branch insignia used on German tunics. The attractive Army breast eagle is the correct early pattern officer's silver bullion hand embroidered type on a dark green background, and does look to have been re-sewn to the tunic at some point. There is oxidation to the bullion embroidery, as well as some light wear, but it still presents very nicely.

The collar is very interesting, and the upper portion is made entirely from flaschengrün (dark bottle-green) wool, without any support fabric inside, so it is quite soft and pliable, much more so than we usually see on M36 tunics. We do not know if it was made this way, or a field alteration to make it more comfortable. It is fitted with officer's style field litzen collar patches on each side, which are woven from silver bullion thread with a dark bottle green background matching the collar. It is in good shape, tough there is wear and some holes around the top edge, which is usually one of the first places to show damage from use. The colored stripes on the litzen are lila (purple), the Waffenfarbe (Corps Color) during WWII for Kriegspfarreren (Field Chaplains) in the Heer Army. As is correct, there are no rank shoulderboards. We have confirmed with period photographs of German Army chaplains that they only had collar insignia.

Above the left pocket is a very nice two award medal ribbon bar, indicating that the wearer had received the Iron Cross 1914 2nd Class and the Hindenburg Cross with Swords due to military service during WWI.

The included breeches are in very good condition, made from whipcord weave fabric with just a bit more green in the mix than the tunic. They have a button fly closure with 5 hidden buttons, and the suspender buttons inside the waist band are all intact. There is a button closed pocket on the right rear sight, as well as the usual vertical slash hip pockets.

A lovely German WWII Army Field Chaplain Uniform Set, ready to research and display!

Approximate Measurements:-
Collar to shoulder: 12"
Shoulder to sleeve: 25.”
Shoulder to shoulder: 16"
Chest width: 16”
Waist: 20"
Hip: 19"
Front length: 31"

Field Tunic (Feldbluse) Model 1936
Terms such as M40 and M43 were never designated by the Wehrmacht, but are names given to the different versions of the Model 1936 field tunic by modern collectors, to discern between variations, as the M36 was steadily simplified and tweaked due to production time problems and combat experience.

When the NSDAP came to power in early 1933 the Reichswehr, the armed forces of the Weimar Republic, were near the end of a two-year project to redesign the Army Feldbluse (field-blouse). Beginning in that year the new tunic was issued to the Reichsheer and then the rapidly growing Wehrmacht Heer, although minor design changes continued to be made until the appearance of the standardized Heeres Dienstanzug Modell 1936. The M36 tunic still retained the traditional Imperial and Reichswehr uniform color of grey-green "field gray" (feldgrau) wool, but incorporated four front patch pockets with scalloped flaps and pleats (on Reichswehr tunics the lower pockets were internal and angled). The front was closed with five buttons rather than the previous eight, and the collar and shoulder straps were of a dark bottle-green instead of the Reichswehr grey. Compared to the Weimar-era uniforms the skirt of the feldbluse was shorter and the tailoring was more form-fitting due to Germany's adoption of mechanized warfare: soldiers now spent much time in the confined space of a vehicle and a shorter jacket was less likely to pick up dirt from the seats. It also included an internal suspension system, whereby a soldier could hang an equipment belt on a series of hooks outside of the tunic. These hooks were connected to two straps inside the lining, which spread the weight of equipment without having to use external equipment suspenders. The M36 was produced and issued until the very end of the war, though successive patterns became predominant.