BACKGROUND: The German army originally adopted a slightly modified version of the NSDAP’s, Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, (National Socialist German Worker’s Party), national eagle by order on February 17TH 1934, with instructions to have it applied to all steel helmets, visor caps, and tunics by May 1ST 1934. Later amendments to the introductory order stipulated that the national eagle was also to be worn on all field caps, the sports uniform and the black panzer wrap tunic. The eagle came in three distinct designs with two having slightly different, out-stretched wings and the third with down-swept wings. Generally officers ranks utilized hand or machine embroidered breast eagles while EM/NCO’s ranks utilized machine embroidered or machine woven breast eagles. During the war the breast eagles were manufactured in a variety of slightly different manufacturing techniques and colorations. This pattern was primarily utilized on the black panzer wrap tunic but it can also be encountered on field blouses.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Machine woven, national breast eagle with outstretched wings, clutching a wreathed, canted, swastika in it’s talons in bright, silver/aluminum flat-wire threads with interwoven black rayon accent threads on a woven, green rayon base. Uniform removed.